The glamorous life of showbiz soon dampened Heather's academic ambitions. She
recalled typing a school paper early one morning. “I said, That's it. I wasn't interested [in school] any more. I never even found out what grade I got on the paper.”
Heather appeared in episodes of “ChiPs” and “Eight is Enough” before landing the role of Sammy Jo Carrington on the nighttime soap “Dynasty” in 1981 while she was still a teenager.
“I laughed at everything until 'Dynasty' came along,” Heather said. “Then I realized, 'Hey. you might have a career. 'Dynasty' was probably the first thing I really wanted.”
“Dynasty” producer Elaine Rich told TV Guide in 1983 that Heather was “everything we hoped for, with a warmth and appeal that goes beyond her being pretty.”
Classic TV Beauties 1980s Countdown
HEATHER LOCKLEAR as Sammy Jo Carrington in "Dynasty" and Stacy Sheridan in "T.J. Hooker"
The blue-eyed girl with the golden hair has a timeless beauty that has endured her to TV audiences since she was barely out of her teens appearing on “TJ Hooker” and “Dynasty.”
Heather earns the No. 1 spot in the 1980s Classic TV Beauties Countdown, not so much for her roles as Sammy Jo and Stacey, but more as a culmination for playing beautiful women in four quality series over the years.
The woman who was named to People magazine's “50 Most Beautiful People” seven years apart (1994 & 2001) has played an impressive list of parts that began with the nighttime soap “Dynasty” and the police drama “T.J. Hooker” in the 1980s, then continued on with “Melrose Place” in the 1990s and “Spin City” in the early 2000s.
Born and raised in Los Angeles, Heather parlayed her southern California natural beauty into modeling and commercial gigs while still a freshman at UCLA. She made TV commercials for Coca-Cola and Disneyland, and appeared in a Polaroid commercial with James Garner.
In an interview with “Entertainment Tonight,” Heather's manager, Joan Green, remembered discovering her.
“I was looking around for new faces and there was this adorable darling girl,” she said. “Within the first year Heather had put something like 60 network commercials on the air, and we both had an idea that in one sense of another showbiz was probably going to be it for her.”
.No. 1
Sammy Jo was a model and the niece of Krystle Carrington (Linda Evans). She played the character in seasons 2-9, and in the 1991 “Dynasty” reunion mini-series.
“When I started being nasty, that's when I started getting letters,” Heather said of playing Sammy Jo in the TV Guide interview.
A mere three years after leaving high school, Heather had the good fortune of starring in two prime-time network series, “TJ Hooker,” as well as “Dynasty.” Both series were produced by Aaron Spelling so Heather had the luxury of shooting her scenes around her schedule.
“People always ask me about 'paying dues,'” she said in the 1983 TV Guide article. “Why do you have to pay dues? I see lots of actresses who've been working and waiting for 10 years for a break and I wonder, Why am I so lucky? Why did I get the chance? I have no answers.”
In “TJ Hooker” she co-starred with William Shatner in the police drama that aired until 1986. The show was never a ratings success – 28th was its best ranking – but it introduced Heather to a new audience of fans.
“It's more fun to be the flamboyant one,” she said on the website www.heather-locklear.net. “Because in real life, we really have to keep it together and be responsible, and we have things to take care of. But when you're playing these outrageous characters, it gives you the freedom to do so much that we could never do in real life. And it's just more fun to be bad.”
Heather was nominated for four Golden Globes in “Melrose” but never won.
She followed her six-year stint on “Melrose Place” by playing campaign Caitlin Moore in “Spin City,” a sitcom featuring the office staff of the mayor of New York City. Heather was nominated twice for Golden Globes, but again did not win.
In the past 10 years Heather has stayed busy. Her best known movie role was playing Hilary Duff's mother in the 2005 romantic comedy “The Perfect Man.”
On TV, she appeared in “Two and a Half Men” in 2004, “Hannah Montana” in 2007, and she reprised her Amanda role in the new “Melrose Place,” 2009-2010.
“Fans of mine, if they watched 'TJ Hooker' or 'Spin City,' they're fans of Heather Locklear,” she said to Esquire in 2002. “If they call me Sammy Jo or Amanda, they're fans of the show."
".I was looking for someone beautiful, fresh and a California blonde; someone
who could be a breakthrough TV personality like Farah Fawcett,” said Rick Husky, “TJ Hooker” supervising producer, also in the TV Guide story on Heather “There aren't too many around, You go to the beach at Malibu and you think there are hundreds of them. But that breakthrough ability is rare: to be loved by fans and fan magazines, and by journalists from the National Enquirer to Vogue."
In her personal life, the chick loved the rock stars, marrying Motley Crue drummer Tommy Lee first, followed by a second marriage to Richie Sambora, Bon Jovi guitarist.
In the 1990s Heather starred as Amanda Woodward, the ruthless advertising executive, in the nighttime soap “Melrose Place.” In a series filled with younger female stars – Josie Bissett, Kristin Davis and Laura Leighton, among others – the thirty-something Heather held her own in the beauty department.
Plus, she enjoyed playing the merciless Amanda.
