Pfabulously Pfeiffer
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Pfabulously Pfeiffer
 With The most noticeable difference between Dedee Pfeiffer and her older sister, Michelle, is Dedee's unapologetic pedal-to-the-metal lifestyle. "I'm the wild Pfeiffer," she says. "Michelle is smart, cautious and shy, whereas I'm wild and outrageous and talk before I think. I'm always flashing people at bars -- not my breasts, but my tattoos. My family and friends know I'm a freak, but society really doesn't. I'll try almost anything once -- not everything, but pretty much."
When we caught Dedee on the phone, she had finished shooting the final episode of the TV series For Your Love and was busy ripping apart her kitchen. "As soon as I hang up, I'm going to prime," she says, laughing. "I bought the cabinets, hung them myself and will prime and paint them. About two o'clock in the morning I'll put down the paintbrush or drill because I get so tired that I know I'm going to hurt myself."
 Dedee channeled this same energy into a slew of odd jobs before getting her big acting break playing a hooker in Into the Night. "I've done everything: I was a cocktail waitress at a mud-wrestling bar, dressed as a monkey and danced in a Disneyland parade, made floral arrangements, worked as a grocery bagger, delivered radiators and made impressions of kids' teeth for an orthodontist," she says. "When I got a role on Simon and Simon, I decided to quit my waitress job. I put my Cash Caddy in my closet and decided right then to make it as an actor. I'm proud that I've never had to pull out that sucker and work tables again."
Roles in such films as The Sky Is Falling, Frankie and Johnny, Falling Down and Up Close and Personal kept her Caddy in the closet, but she is probably most recognized for her TV roles as Cybill Shepherd's almost-always pregnant older daughter on Cybill and devoted wife Sheri on the romantic-comedy series For Your Love. "It was like having a second family," she says of the latter. "We'd roll around with one another on the couches and the beds; we'd hug and kiss all the crew. I miss that."
 When she's not auditioning for roles, Dedee donates a lot of time to children's, AIDS, cancer and wildlife organizations. "If there is a wounded animal on the side of the road, I will take it to a wildlife center," she says. "I have no fear of animals -- I've saved dogs, deer, rattlesnakes and tarantulas." Does she fear seeing any of the movies she's made? "I feel lucky to have gotten gigs, even the ones that went right to video," she says. "To dodge bad things is not to understand life's lessons. I don't regret any of the work I've done. I'm at a place now where I can take a deep breath and say, 'OK, I can read for things that are going to move my career to the next level.' My goal as an actor is not to become a huge star like my sister. I just want to have respect and longevity. But if huge success comes, I will embrace it."
Copyright Playboy magazine 20020200 -- Photography by Stephen Wayda |
