Jennifer Ashley

Sultry, spirited and appealing brunette Jennifer Ashley began her show business career as a contestant in beauty pageants. Among the titles she won are Miss Restaurant, Miss Truck Show and Miss Textile. A native of the suburbs of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Jennifer studied fabric design for a short spell at the Philadelphia College of Textiles and Science. The brown-eyed and brown-haired Ashley eventually moved to San Francisco and worked for Columbia Records. Francis Ford Coppola suggested to Jennifer that she audition for a role in "American Graffiti." She didn't get the part, but Ashley did make her film debut with a small role in the comedy "Your Three Minutes Are Up." Jennifer next appeared as a groupie in Brian De Palma's delightfully outrageous "Phantom of the Paradise." She was terrorized by a deranged Andrew Prine in the splendidly sleazy psycho exploitation gems "Barn of the Naked Dead" and "The Centerfold Girls." Ashley's other notable roles include a foxy high school cheerleader in the drive-in hit "The Pom Pom Girls," one of macho shark hunter Hugo Stiglitz's lovers in the dreadful "Jaws" rip-off "Tintorera," crazed religious fanatic Stuart Whitman's mistress in the incredibly tasteless "Guyana: Cult of the Damned," an astronaut group leader in the gruesome "Alien" clone "Inseminoid," and a tough prison inmate in the terrifically trashy babes-behind-bars classic "Chained Heat." In 1985 Jennifer launched her own hugely successful talk show called "Ashley's Closet," in which she served as both host and executive producer. The #1-rated weekly 30-minute program ran on two local Los Angeles cable channels. Ashley's last film role to date was a small part as a TV show host in the comedy "Me, Myself and I." Moreover, Jennifer is also an accomplished abstract painter and a health, fitness and nutrition buff. Ashley now has her own clothing line called Hippie Ink.