Heather Locklear: The Heather on the Hill

From the mountain aerie she shares with rocker mate Richie Sambora, TV queen Heather Locklear lays out her strategy for becoming a movie star, gives the lowdown on why she'll opt for plastic surgery down the road, and comments on the headline-grabbing exploits of her first husband, Tommy Lee.

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You've got to climb Mt. Everest to reach the Valley of the Dolls . . .

Why, as I'm on my way to interview Heather Locklear, is bad dialogue from Valley of the Dolls running through my head? Simply because had she not existed, someone like Dolls novelist Jacqueline Susann might well have invented Locklear as a heroine of a sexy showbiz novel. Even a thumbnail sketch of her life sounds distinctly Susann-esque: Quintessential California homecoming queen, blessed with considerable charm and less considerable acting skills, stars in two successful TV series; then, at an age when other actresses are playing mothers, becomes a full-on sex symbol in a third hit series. In real life, rumored to be surgically enhanced, our tawny beauty marries not one, but two bad-boy, wild-maned rock musicians. Get the picture? Even her very name, Heather Locklear, is a dichotomy: froth and steel, Hollywood and heartland, Glasgow and Goleta.

For those of you who pride yourselves on ignoring tamp and pop culture icons, Locklear is TV's stylishly dark-rooted bitch goddess, first seen in "T.J. Hooker" and "Dynasty." more recently credited with jolting "Melrose Place" hack into the ratings. By turning that trick, Locklear jolted herself onto TV stardom's top rung and saved herself from sliding back into the Grade-2 movies from whence she came (remember Return of the Swamp Thing?). Of late, she has made stabs at an A-level big-screen movie career. Though the first, The First Wives Club, has proved to be a disappointment for her, she's already signed for another.

Arriving at the hilltop mansion Locklear shares with her second husband, Bon Jovi guitarist Richie Sambora, I'm not quite sure what to expect: the high-style, manipulative Joan Crawford toughie she plays on weekly TV, or the multiple-personality basket case she lined in a recent TV movie. Happily, it's neither. Locklear saunters barefoot out of her house to greet me at my ear. She's down-to-earth and friendly on sight, and--clad in bun-hugging gray workout briefs and a tight white halter lop--a fetching sight. Zero entourage. Zero altitude. Zero pretense. We've barely introduced ourselves when I'm hustled inside for a lour of her palatial digs. As I check out her miles of marble, glittery chandeliers and nose- bleed-high ceilings. I can't help but blurt. "Jeez. Heather, you're definitely rich--and probably spoiled, too." She laughs merrily, sweeps out her arms, and gushes, "Isn't it faaabulous? Rich? OK, maybe. But spoiled? I've only been spoiled for 17 years."

She whirls me into a living room appointed with enough antique velvet, brocade and 24-karat Louis Quinze this and that to stock a Versailles fire sale. The vibe is so sinfully opulent. I toss out this query: "Which of the seven deadly sins gives you the most trouble?" She throws herself into one of the room's bow ling alley-sized sofas, laughs, then says, "Lust! I've even got a framed Erté titled 'Lust.' I can't say it's the deadly sin that sets me in trouble, though, because, it's more actually the sin that gets me excited. Very excited. Luckily, because I'm married. I also get really good jewelry out of it.

"Speaking of lust." she says, jumping up. "I'll show you something I bought Richie-who I miss terribly right now, but if he were here, he'd be talking about himself, and where would that leave me?" She scampers to a table, retrieves a book and hands it over. It's an imported art volume of wildly erotic paintings of such things as AK-47-sized penises, watermelon breasts, and orgiastic contortions of every stripe.

"So," I ask, "since you and your husband own this thing, have you used it to expand your repertoire?"

"Well, that's always been great and I've always been great." she purrs, "and it's only gotten more so." Her laughing eyes spell things out: We didn't need a book, honey.

"Then you and Richie don't, like some people we could mention, videotape yourselves doing the deed?" I needn't make specific mention of that now-infamous home video of sexual triathletes Pamela Anderson and Tommy Lee--Locklear's ex-hubby--which was allegedly swiped from their in-home safe. Arching her brow playfully, Locklear shoots back, "Who says we haven't? But at least we keep ours in an underground safe where no one else can get at it."

"So, you, unlike that other celebrity wife, wouldn't brag in print about your husband's sexual prowess or the size of his charms?"

Locklear growls, "You mean his penis? I like it, I mean, I should hope I like it because I'm married to it for the rest of my life. But enough about my husband for right now: Let's talk about me-me-me-me-ME!"

OK, fine, I inquire what she's been reading of late, and she guiltily confesses she's been perusing an unauthorized Heather Locklear biography. "This morning, as I was looking through this junk." she explains, "this book was say ing stuff like that I had gone out with Christopher Atkins, which I never did. There's some really weird stuff in this book, stuff that is so not true. Sometimes, they gel a little bit right, then build onto it and get it all wrong. However, when I got to what critics in the Boston Globe or the Herald, whatever, actually said about me, like how I'm always 'very nice' and all, but that they think I suck, I went, 'Uggh, that's the real thing.' Let's face it, 20,000 nice things can be said about you and though you appreciate and really need the nice, you remember the knocks instead."

Well, journalistic dissing of her acting chops aside, how might she assess herself on screen?

"I've just always thought I had a winning personality and that was all that mattered," she answers. "I mean, look, I watched the first TV things I did. Even today, I watch "Melrose Place' and I think: I suck. Half the time, I can't even see my performance because I'm busy looking at my roots or going, 'Shouldn't they use another couple of filters on me right about now?'"

Would she agree with the millions of "'Melrose Place"-niks who find her sexy? "Well," she reminds me, "Teri Hatcher is the most downloaded image on the Internet, not me. Look, it's even hard for me to go to auditions for roles where it's supposed to be a sexy girl in high heels and shorts. I usually go, 'Guys, I'll be sexy in a pair of tight pants and thick-heeled shoes so that I can stand up, walk and not be so nervous.' Auditions are always gross, weird and awkward--I'm usually just so grateful when those damn things are over. If I saw someone like Sharon Stone coming out from a reading as I was going in, it would psych me out so bad, I'd probably cry, have to head home and send a message: 'I can't make the audition.'"

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