Ask Alexandra – June 2013

1) I have been a fan of yours for years…from Baywatch, to your movies, to your activism. I even took your lead and bought a Chevy Volt a month ago! I can’t imagine ever driving a gasoline powered car again.

I was watching Dancing with the Stars last night with my wife and was wondering if you would ever consider gracing the show?!
Andy Cunningham

Hi Andy,

Congratulations on your Volt! I hope you are loving it as much as Ian and I do. We have driven over 50,000 miles and are getting an average of 183 mpg in the last couple months. So glad to hear you are now an EV convert.

As for Dancing with the Stars, it looks like an amazing experience for the participants, but truthfully I do not think my knees could take it. I had knee surgery several years ago, and jumping, running or hard impact hurts them both. Just doing the diving show I did last year, which was only 10 days of practice before the competition, was extremely hard on my shoulders, so I cannot imagine dancing for weeks and weeks. And in heels! Yowzah.

Thank you for your email, Andy. I wish you miles and miles of EV smiles!

Best,
Alexandra

2) Hi Alexandra 🙂 Does Venice Beach still looks like it did in baywatch ? I’m from Sweden and want to go there. And is acting that nice like it seems to be ? Do you talk to your old cast-mebers still ? 😛

// Chris B

Hi Chris,

Venice Beach still looks like it did when we filmed there – it might be even more crowded and crazy nowadays. Baywatch was mostly filmed about 5 miles north of there, at Will Rogers State Beach, between Santa Monica and Pacific Palisades. The Baywatch lifeguard set was built on top of a real lifeguard station there (in the show you can see the characters had to go up stairs from the beach to to get to it), and we filmed right next to real lifeguards working in their headquarters, but you couldn’t see them through the tinted glass. Our set is no longer there, but the headquarters is, at the south end of the parking lot.

Acting is as nice as it seems to be. There are challenges, of course: the balancing act of staying emotionally open but still having a thick skin to withstand all the rejection; the long shooting days (12 hours at least) and sometimes nights (exhausting times when at 3 am you are so tired you feel nauseous and your body clock is all turned around). The cold, the rain, the repetition, the waiting – but every job has its challenges. I feel grateful to have worked for 3 decades in this one!

I still talk to my old Baywatch castmates – in fact, just this morning I spoke with Michael Bergin on the phone and had emails from Kelly Packard and David Chokachi. I also talked to Jaason Simmons yesterday afternoon. Jeremy Jackson, Michael Bergin, Jaason, Kelly and I are having dinner together in a couple days, actually, to discuss B Team business. Another reason why acting rocks – the people involved are awesome!

I have not been to Sweden, but have met lovely people from there, so I want to visit your country!

Thank you for writing,
Alexandra

3) Once upon a time there was a parody of Baywatch called Son of the Beach. Stephanie’s counterpart Kimberlee was played by Kim Oja. She described her character as “I’m the flat-chested one with the measurable IQ.” When asked have she ever met you she replied: “I saw her at my yoga class one time. I followed her around and did whatever exercises she was doing.”

Did you ever see the show in question?
J-E Lindqvist

Hi JE,

I never did see the show, but I have heard of it. I looked up Kim Oja and I will keep an eye out for her in yoga class! I used to go to YogaWorks in Santa Monica, so she is probably telling the truth.

I hope next time she sees me, she introduces herself!

Alexandra