Loni Anderson

Loni has more recently starred in the resurrected comedy series My Sister Is So Gay (2016).

In 2008, she married a fourth time to musician Bob Flick.

Millennium TV credits include the sitcom The Mullets (2003) and as Tori Spelling's materialistic mother in So Notorious (2006), which did not get the seal of approval from Tori's real-life mother.

" Her last film was in the SNT-based comedy A Night at the Roxbury (1998).

Over time, she has enjoyed such lightweight sitcoms as her regular role in Nurses (1991), and as a guest in such TV comedies as "New WKRP in Cincinnati" (in which she recreated her Jennifer role), "Empty Nest," "Sabrina the Teenage Witch" and "Clueless.

Not helping things was her high-profile marriage to Reynolds in 1988, which began blissfully enough (and produced adopted son Quinton), then dissolved quickly into a nasty divorce in 1993 that damaged the reputations of both stars. In later years, Loni showed incredible perseverance. As always, the stalwart beauty continued to play up the glam but has since downplayed the dramatics. She seems more focused these days on having innocuous fun, playing a number of hearty vixens in sitcoms and series guest spots.

She also was given a chance to work in feature films such as Stroker Ace (1983). While her performance in that film was panned, it did have her meeting and co-starring opposite mega star Burt Reynolds. Appearing in routine, mini-movie soap operas (via her own production company), if anything, kept Loni in the public eye as a serious-minded actress, but it was an uphill battle to rise above her manufactured image as a fantasy bombshell.

On the other hand, her instant fame led to the breakup of her second marriage to Bickell in 1981. Loni found hit-and-miss success outside the parameters of her comedy series.

She was front-and-center in a number of television-movies, notably playing tragic Hollywood sex sirens Jayne Mansfield in The Jayne Mansfield Story (1980), opposite Arnold Schwarzenegger as her muscle-bound husband Mickey Hargitay, and Thelma Todd, in White Hot: The Mysterious Murder of Thelma Todd (1991), whose untimely death in 1935 is still questioned. Loni also appeared lusciously alongside Bob Hope, brightening up several of his classic television specials.

As sexy but smart Jennifer Marlowe on the sitcom WKRP in Cincinnati (1978), the ravishing star later became a soap-styled fixture in mini-movies. All eyes were peeled on this worthy pin-up who helped to bring back the glossy platinum-blonde allure of Marilyn Monroe, Jayne Mansfield and Mamie Van Doren. Loni strove for much more than a sex pedestal as she tried to parlay her newly found fame into a viable dramatic career.

" By the time she nabbed the role of Jennifer Marlowe on WKRP in Cincinnati (1978), she had grown quite admirably as an actress. Loni and Howard Hesseman became the breakaway stars of the sitcom and Loni skyrocketed to sexy status, earning two Emmy nominations in the process.

Auditioned for the role of Chrissy Snow on the situation comedy Three's Company (1976), which went to Suzanne Somers.

On the minus side, she fizzled in her teaming up with equally sexy Wonder Woman (1975) star Lynda Carter in the tepid, short-lived series Partners in Crime (1984) and then played a former Las Vegas showgirl who inherits a bundle in the sitcom misfire Easy Street (1986).

Re-married in 1973 to actor, Ross Bickell, the couple decided to move away from Minnesota to Los Angeles in 1975 and actively pursue film and television work. Pounding the proverbial pavement, she eventually went blonde and this, plus her gorgeous looks, helped her to secure minor but sexy roles on such series as "S. W. A. T. ," "Police Woman," "Barnaby Jones," "Three's Com[any," and "The Bob Newhart Show.

A bodacious, be-dimpled, pert-nosed, well-endowed knockout, Loni Anderson earned an assured TV sex symbol pedestal during the late 1970s and early 1980s.

Still dark-haired, she played in several early 1970s productions such as "Born Yesterday" (as Billie Dawn), "Send Me No Flowers", "Can-Can" and "The Star-Spangled Girl". She even played "Tzeitel" in "Fiddler on the Roof" and appeared in a production of "The Threepenny Opera".

An art student at the University of Minnesota, she entered (and won) beauty contests on the sly (including a Miss Minnesota runner-up placing in 1964). Married and divorced from Bruce Hasselberg before she reached age 21, Loni took on a teaching position to support herself and baby daughter (Deidre) while completing college. Developing an interest in acting, she went the route many aspiring thespians do -- apprenticing in local commercials and theater shows.

Won a bushel of local beauty contests as a teenager including her hometown Miss Roseville pageant in 1963 which allowed her to compete (and become a finalist) in the Miss Minnesota competition. Among her other, less prestigious, titles were; Miss Thermo-Jac Clothing, Miss Thom McCann Shoes, Miss County Style Ford, Miss No Frost Eskimo and Queen of the Hole-In-One.

She met with a measured degree of success as she recreated the lives of such artificial sex sirens as Mansfield and Thelma Todd on television, but got bogged down in television-movie re-tellings of famous movie classics (Three Coins in the Fountain (1954), Sorry, Wrong Number (1948), Leave Her to Heaven (1945)) that could not help but pale in comparison. This attempt at seriousness was further hampered by messy tabloid headlines in her private life.

Loni Kaye Anderson was born with very dark (jet black) hair on August 5, 1945 in St. Paul, Minnesota, the daughter of a chemist.