Jane Badler Is HOT!

All Photos:  Alan Mercer  Make-up: Rosalina Da Silva   Lighting:  Eric V.

Jane Badler is best known for her role as Diana, the chief antagonist in NBC's science fiction TV series, 'V', between 1983-85. Jane also appeared in ABC's "reimagined" version of 'V'in 2011, again playing an alien named Diana, but who is the mother of the series' chief antagonist, Anna. In recent years, Jane Badler has also become an established nightclub singer in Australia, where she lives, and has released two fantastic albums.

Jane spent her teen years in Great Neck, New York, moving to Manchester, New Hampshire when she was in high school. She won the title Miss New Hampshire and competed at the 1973 Miss America Pageant. Subsequently, she enrolled at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois to study drama.

Jane Badler's first television role was on the American daytime soap opera 'One Life To Live' which she played from 1977 to 1981 and again in 1983. During her run, she also appeared in a 1979 episode of the primetime series 'Fantasy Island.'  Jane also starred on the daytime soap opera 'The Doctors.'

Following 'V', Jane co-starred with Jose Ferrer in the made-for-TV supernatural thriller 'Covenent.' The following year she guest-starred as Meredith Braxton throughout the 1986-87 season of the CBS primetime soap opera 'Falcon Crest.' Her other guest appearances during the 1980s included 'Riptide,' 'Hotel' and 'Murder She Wrote.'

In 1987, she played the role of Tania Winthrop in the short-lived action-adventure series 'The Highwayman.'  She then traveled to Australia to play agent Shannon Reed in the 1980s revival of 'Mission Impossible' for its second and third seasons, from 1989 to 1990.

After the series ended, Jane moved to Australia permanently and married businessman Stephen Hains. They have two sons, Sam and Harry. She later appeared on the Australian game show 'Cluedo' from 1992 to 1993, and had a guest-starring role in 'Snowy River: The McGregor Saga' in 1995.

Already an able singer when she competed in the Miss New Hampshire and Miss America Pageants, Jane Badler forged a career in cabaret and on the stage.  Jane has released two albums with the band Sir titled 'The Devil Has My Double' in 2008 and 'Tears Again' in 2011.

I met Jane when she visited Los Angeles recently for a couple of days.  We shot these photos in her room at the Four Season's Hotel in Beverly Hills.  Eric Venturo helped with all the lighting and Rosalina Da Silva did a great job with the hair and make-up. 

I was in love with Jane Badler long before I photographed her.  Meeting and talking with her for this blog was a thrill I will never forget.  She has this magnificent beauty that radiates from behind her penetrating eyes, and is she ever fun!!!! 

AM:  What brings you to the United States?

JB:  I had to go to Paris because I just signed with a record label over there, a subsidiary of Sony Music, and they are very artsy.  I had a week of meetings with my music manager.  I felt like I was close to New York so I went and saw my Mother and the rest of my family.  I came to Los Angeles to touch base with the industry.  I wanted to shoot with you of course and I did another shoot as well.  I saw my agent and said hello.  I actually still care!

AM:  Do you find having a career in the United States challenging while living in Australia?

JB:  Yes, very challenging.  It's a great way of life but you can only go so far and then the opportunities really do lie overseas. 

AM:  You ended up in Australia because you married someone and started a family correct?

JB:  Yes that's true.  I was filming the television show 'Mission Impossible' and I met this beautiful Australian man and twenty-one years later I'm still there.  It's been a god sent because 'V' brought me back to America last year and my kids are older so suddenly my career is becoming more international again. 

AM:  All the on-line networking really helps the fan base doesn't it?

JB:  It's unbelievable.  First of all I would not have been back on 'V' without the fans who made such a stink.  I had no idea I had so many fans.  How many years ago was 'V'?  Like twenty-five years ago.  I just thought that would be that, but then ever since facebook there are so many fans out there that I never would have known about.  It's like a parallel world where you don't have to be working in the real world but there's this enormous fan base generated by the internet. 

AM: I see many people being very interested in you and wanting you to be on more shows. 

JB:  That's good.  I think there's a lot of people that want me, it's just that I need to make the effort to get out of Australia.  That is not where I am understood or where I'm going to make my mark.  That's my playground where I can practice my craft. 

AM:  Have you always been a singer?

JB:  Yes I've been singing since I was little.  I played guitar and flute and I sang my way through university.  Then in the Miss America Pageant singing was my talent.  I used to sing on weekends in New Hampshire.  After I graduated I started to do a lot of acting so I stopped singing. 

AM:  When did you return to singing?

JB:  I got back to singing about eight years ago. 

AM: Do you find people are surprised that you are a singer?

JB:  Yes I think with anything that you do, people have to start to "get it."  At first, I think people did resist it and didn't take me seriously, but I'm noticing more and more on twitter and facebook that people are asking me when am I going to sing somewhere?  When are we going to see you here?  It takes time to educate people about what you are doing and that you are serious about it and not a lightweight. 

AM:  You are such a genuinely talented singer that I wouldn't think anything other than you are a singer.

JB:  Thank you!  That's the thing about it, for the last ten years I've been singing jazz and doing one woman shows.  I've taught myself piano.  Now I'm writing.  I think OK Jane, if you're going to do this, you have to actually be doing this! 

AM:  How did you hook up with your band?

JB:  This is such an amazing story.  I like to say that I was in jazz obscurity.  I was going around town singing jazz but let's be honest I was never going to be Ella Fitzgerald.  I wasn't changing the mold here. 

AM:  Were you singing a lot of standards?

JB:  Yes I was singing standards and learning the ropes, but everyone is doing that.  Then about four years ago this guy approached me and said, "I know this is weird but I'm in an Indie band and I'd like you to front the band and sing on our next record."  So I listened to it and it was really monotone and I thought it was really weird stuff.  My husband told me to not even think about it.

AM:  What happened to change your mind?

JB:  The more I listened to it I realized there was something to it with the lyrics and all.  I thought I could do what he was doing but take it much further with what he had done.  Now it's been four years and we've done a second album.  Hopefully we will do another album. 

AM:  Did you write some of the songs?

JB:  I wrote 'Nursery Rhyme' which is a bit dark.  It's about a person who can never forgive the betrayal of someone she loved so she becomes twisted and becomes a prostitute!  (Laughing) 

AM:  Where do these ideas come from?

JB:  I kind of think like that.  I know it sounds weird because I'm actually a very happy person but I do have a dark side.  The whole album was written for me.  We sit down and we storyboard. 

AM:  Tell me about 'Snow Carnival Queen?'

JB:  I was the Snow Carnival Queen in New Hampshire when I was seventeen.  It's about the fork in the road.  When you are Snow Carnival Queen you think your life is going to turn out so incredible, and yet it didn't.  I think it's an amazing song.  I have been a muse for Jesse.  He's been amazing for me and I never want to let him go, but he's just married and about to have a child. 

AM:  I love both albums and I like the fact that it is ambient music and a little soap opera-ish!

JB:  Yes totally. 

AM:  I get wrapped up in the drama of this couple in their world.

JB:  That's it.  It's a total collaboration.  Whether Jesse is singing those songs or not, his voice and my voice are totally together. 

AM:  I also find the music cinematic and think it could be developed into a film.

JB:  We do have a second music video that is out now.  We are doing another video.  I'm totally into visuals.  The more visuals the better.  I have to wait and see what happens in Paris because they will want to put their own take on everything. 

AM:  Will they want to take you away from this?

JB:  No it will be this music, but I'm a bit of a chameleon. You can see the live performances with an orchestra that sounds just like the album, or see my Indie band that has a grunge sound, and I've also done it in a Cabaret show where I was threw flowers at the audience.  I really took it far.  My point is I can take this and do almost anything with it.  That's the problem is I am a chameleon.  Paris will tell me where they want to put me.  I suspect they will want to put a band together.  This is just so exciting for me. 

AM:  It's a lot more tangible than being an actress in a lot of ways.

JB:  And it's safer for me.  When you act you go somewhere.  You can lose what you have.  You say good-bye husband and children.  It's an obsessive thing.  It's a great thing but it's dangerous.  I feel safer singing.  I feel like I go sing and fantasize for the night and then I'm home.  It's healthier for me. 

AM:  Do you say it's dangerous because you can get lost in a character?

JB:  Yes, because it's exciting and like a junkie addiction.  I become obsessive and that's not so great.  You always come back but it's a lot to ask of your partner.  Let's be honest, it's a very selfish thing.  Now that I have good representation I very much plan on coming back here to work again.  That is something I really want to do. 

AM:  So if you get a job in Los Angeles you would come back now?

JB:  Yes I would.  My husband understands that I have lived in Australia for twenty-one years now.  How much time does anyone really have?  I don't want to play an old lady.  This is my time and I'm going to go for it because it will pass. 

AM:  Would your husband come with you?

JB:  He would come with me.  It's all negotiable.  It's all very do-able.  The world is small now.  We all have to follow our dreams wherever they take you.

AM:  Did you ever think you were going to live in Australia?    

JB:  Yes, I went there in the Eighties and I absolutely fell in love with the Australian men.  These men are really hot.  They are not so complicated like American men.  They are very manly.  I fell in love with this guy and I could see myself living there and strangely enough five years later 'Mission Impossible' filmed over there.  I met my husband this time and I knew I was walking away, but I was ready.  I was in my early thirties and doing a lot of Eighties television like 'Falcon Crest' and it didn't feel soulful.  I thought to myself that I didn't like where I was heading and I didn't know how to get out of it.  I think the best thing I did was to reinvent myself.  I needed to get back to basics. 

AM:  What I find fascinating is that you weren't even on the original 'V' very much.  Your part was rather small yet memorable.  Then they brought you back for the new version.

JB:  Right!  I think it's great they did that because it brought me to a whole new audience and once again they didn't give me much to do.  They just stuck me in a dungeon.  They didn't understand how good it could have been.  I was very frustrated by that but very excited to be back in the market again. 

AM:  You are in the middle of your career.

JB:  I think I am. 

AM:  I'm thrilled that you're a singer. 

JB:  Me too.

AM:  Once a movie or show is over with that's it, but the music stays in your head and you can take it with you and listen over and over.          

JB:  I'm thrilled for Jesse too.  I think he is so gifted and I'm hoping that people know of him as well.  They are starting to know of him.  People are always asking me about him now.  I hope he starts writing for other people as well.  He deserves it. He is brilliant! 

AM:  Will you ever tour with a band in the United States?

JB:  I think I will start with Europe because that's what has come to me.  What I do is very European.  My persona is European.  I love wearing costumes and want to connect with designers in Paris.  I think it would be more of a struggle in the United States.  I'm not really mainstream.  I need to go where I'm wanted. 

AM:  Are you going back to Paris to record new music?

JB:  I hope so.  I'm chomping at the bit.  We have to do contracts next.  It all takes so much time. 

AM:  I notice with many women that when their children grow up and leave home, they are ready to get back into the world.  Did you really want children?

JB:  I wanted children but did I want to devote myself to them? (Laughing) Not particularly...it's hard because I'm an artist and I was constantly battling with myself.  It was not an easy road.  I was never Yippee I'm a Mom...yum, yum.  It was more like this is hard! 

AM:  I'm glad to hear you say this and I don't think you should feel guilty about it.    

JB:  Well I battled with it and I never did stop working.  I was always doing avant-garde theater even if there were only eight people in the audience.  I never stopped doing what I do. 

AM:  What was your motivation?

JB:  I felt like if I wasn't doing something I was drowning.  I felt like I was dying.  It was death. 

AM:  So you need to be creative in some form or another in order to be happy?

JB:  I am the most miserable person if I'm not doing something creative.  I'm just unhappy.  That's why it didn't matter that the audiences were so small.  I have a very strong and powerful business man husband and his whole family is strong.  I walked away from everything that I knew and was comfortable in.  I was easily swallowed up by him and his family.  All I had was my identity as a performer so I had to keep doing that. 

AM:  I love how you grew up in Brooklyn, home of a very strong accent and you actually have a subtle Australian accent now!

JB:  Right!  I used to have the East coast accent.  I'm a Brooklyn girl! 

AM:  How did you lose so much of the accent?

JB:  I lived in New Hampshire and went to school in Chicago and I've lived in London and Los Angeles.  I'm an amalgamation of everywhere I've been.

AM: How do you keep your confidence up?

JB:  Being artistic, there are times when you question what you are doing and if you're doing it right.  I think it's these thoughts that make you good.  You realize that anything can be thrown at you and you rise to the occasion. 

AM:  I'm glad that you are telling the truth about how hard times can be.  Often people look at someone like you and think it all came so easy.

JB:  No,  I can't tell you how many closed doors I've had in my face.  It's like anything, I can go to two agents and one will say, " It's too hard.  You're this age and you live out of the country."  Then the other agent will say, "Wow, this is good.  What do you want to do?  I'm going to make this happen!"  Those are the people that you need in your life. 

AM:  That attitude came through when we first talked about you being on the blog.  You weren't afraid like so many.

JB:  I'm always available and open to new things.  Look at this great day!  Would we have had this day?  This was a magical day! 

AM:  With nothing planned at all!

JB:  I'm into free falling.  I like to think where is it going to take me?  That's where magic happens. 

AM:  You know it was one of your fans in England named Brett that wanted me to do this with you.  I'm so happy he suggested you.

JB:  You see it's the fans!

AM:  I thought since you lived in Australia you would never be here and wouldn't do it.

JB:  Yet here I am. 

AM:  Thank you so much for making time for me.

JB:  I'm so excited.  I can't wait to see the photos!!!

To learn more about Jane Badler visit her web site http://www.janebadler.com/