A Melrose Place reunion...

At the Beverly Hilton bash for the release of the "Melrose Place" DVD, there were some noteable first-season cast member absences: Heather Locklear, Courtney Thorne-Smith, Andrew Shue Josie Bisset, and Amy Lacone. I can't blame Amy since she was written out of the show fairly quickly but I thought it was really classy of Vanessa Williams - who played spunky Rhonda the first year - to show up with so much enthusiasm and positive energy.
Vanessa (no, not the former Miss America Vanessa L. Williams) told me she was excited to see fellow castmates Doug Savant, Grant Show and Daphne Zuniga, who did make the event.
"It's been great to watch everyone's career blossom and grow. We were all so young when we did the show," Vanessa said. "We are part of the pop culture of our decade. Rhonda was me. We were both bats out of hell from New York."
The "Melrose" gig was only her second showbiz job and she remembers beating out Rae Dawn Chong and others for the part. There was the other Vanessa Williams who had more fame, but this Vanessa Williams had registered with the Screen Actors Guild first so the beauty queen would have to add the "L" initial to her name when acting.
"We've never met but we have mutual friends."
Sadly, Williams was written off the show after just one season: "I was devastated," she remembers. "It really was a 'Welcome to Hollywood' experience. It was a huge sting and an absolute surprise." But the actress successfully moved on, making movies and doing television guest spots including recurring roles on "Chicago Hope" and "Murder One" and was one of the stars of the series "Soul Food."
Daphne Zuniga joined the show halfway through season one as photographer Jo, who had a serious relationship with Jake (Show). Zuniga was already a familiar face with starring roies in the feature films "The Sure Thing," "Gross Anatomy" and "Spaceballs." Most recently, she was the star of the ABC Family series "Beautul People."
"("Beautiful People") is already out on DVD and "Melrose Place" took forever!" said Zuniga, who doesn't look much different than she did 14 years ago when she started playing Jo. "I loved Jo. She started out really strong. But I think they started writing her too victimy when she started dating every loser in town."
Zuniga says her early roles still follow her around. She just retirned from a 10-day silent meditation retreat and once the silence was over, the teacher walked up to her and said, "I remember you as Jo Reynolds and from 'Spaceballs.'"

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