TERESA HILL: ONE "MODEL" WITH A PASSION FOR ACTING
By Scott Palmer, 72250.1655@compuserve.com

If you think that being beautiful makes everything easy -- then think again. Teresa Hill, who plays dishy but naive model Linda Holden on "Models, Inc.," has survived abusive relationships, gratuitous Gilbert & Sullivan, and the million-to-one odds against showbiz success. The result? A career that already includes four movies, a prime-time soap, and a steadily-growing avalanche of fan mail.

Hill, a thoughtful and articulate actress who is quite different from her "Models, Inc." character, grew up in Salt Lake City, Utah with three sisters and two brothers. She discovered early that she had a passion for acting.

"In junior high school, I was really shy," she recalled. "Acting was a way I could show a different side of myself. It was really fun."

Fun, of course, has never been a reliable way to pay the rent, so it took courage for Hill to move from Utah to Los Angeles -- even if becoming an actress was only in the back of her mind.

"I moved to L.A. when I was 18, though not to pursue acting," she said. "Coming from Utah, you didn't 'pursue' acting. But I took an acting class [at Santa Monica Community College], was in a showcase, got a manager out of it, and started doing it seriously."

Hill's family was initially skeptical about her ambitions. "At first, they were just like, 'come back home'," she said. "But now, they're totally excited, proud of me, and they think it's really great." Two of her sisters have now joined her in Los Angeles, their skepticism vanquished by her undeniable success.

Her first movie roles were in the straight-to-video horror flicks "Puppet Master 4" and "Puppet Master 5" -- "I did a lot of screaming and passing out," she recalled.

More upscale assignments followed, however, and she recently completed work in "Spirit" with Shelley Winters, Diane Ladd, Sean Flannery, and Michael Pare. She also has a starring role with Barry Bostwick in an upcoming Roger Corman movie titled "The Unfaithful." (Yes, almost everyone who's anyone has done a Roger Corman movie at one time or another.)

Outside of acting -- well, there's not much outside of acting, at least while "Models, Inc." is in production. Hill enjoys reading (her current book is "The Celestine Prophecy") and music by groups such as Enya and Enigma, "music you can listen to and relax," she said.

The biggest challenge for Hill on "Models, Inc." has been to portray a troubled girl trapped in a relationship with an abusive boyfriend, who some fans of the show have taken to calling "Scumbag Eric."

"I really like the part of Linda, because I've been in abusive relationships," she said. "Not as bad as her, of course. I'm sure that most women have."

Hill also sees an opportunity for her character to make a difference in some viewers' lives. "People keep on saying, 'Oh, it's TV, it's all just trash.' But if people can watch it and learn something from it, if a girl can look at my character and say, 'That's like me,' and root for Linda to get out of the relationship, then maybe she can start looking at herself."

"And men, too. I think it's time that both men and women say, this [spousal abuse] just isn't right. That's what I hope."

In spite of the villainies inflicted on her character by Scumbag Eric, Hill was decidedly gentle when asked if she'd like to see Linda "get even" with her fictional tormentor. "I'd love to see her get away from him, and get stronger within herself."

And what about Linda's revenge? "You know what I'd like to do to Eric? I'd like to throw him out the front door and lock him out," she said.

Pretty bloodthirsty stuff -- at least, for a nice girl from Utah who's on the fast track to stardom.

[end of interview]

Interview originally appeared in The "MODELS, INC." FAN CLUB NEWSLETTER, distributed world-wide on Compuserve, America Online, and the Internet. Date: Issue #1, August, 1994. Newsletter Editor: Scott Palmer, 72250.1655@compuserve.com