Beautiful People's Daphne Zuniga: Facing Her Fears and Ready to Fall in Love

quotI love men in bed when they are sleepingquot smiles Daphne Zuniga quotBut then they have to go and wake upquotDaphne the star of the ABC Family series Beautiful People has been in a couple of longterm relationships and twice was proposed to and she now says she39s emotionally ready for marriage and children quotI love men who are vigilantly following their passions who are emotionally ready for commitment and who are maybe even a little crazy Men who are selfinterested and narcissistic couldn39t be more boringquotPlaying a single mother who is getting back to dating on Beautiful People was energizing for Daphne quotI stopped dating for six months a year agoquot she admits quotDating requires a lot of energy and focus I39ve had 40 years of fun and now I39m looking for someone for my heartquotAt our Lunch at Michael39s in New York and subsequent breakfast at the Beverly Hilton Hotel in Beverly Hills Daphne shared her insights on men marriage and children on her life since Melrose Place on her childhood and unusual parents and on her passions especially the issues of mercury poisoning and women39s self imageThe former star of the FoxTV series Melrose Place whose first breakout role was Princess Vespa in Mel Brooks39 Spaceballs says she doesn39t look at Beautiful People as a comeback She has done several guest star roles films madeforTV movies and was a regular guest on NBC39s American Dreams quotI39m thrilled to be working this hard and relieved to be working with a generation younger than me They have an authentic awe and excitement that is contagious It feels fantastic like a rebirth There39s no feeling of a comeback when you39re just living your lifequot Daphne is also writing a onewoman show about relationships to quotshow a different side of myself and where I am now in my lifequotquotI39m grateful for Melrose but it39s a chapter in the past When you have success when you39re young in this business you focus on yourself and hope you39re someone who is worthy of the success You39re on a hot show so you think you must be good and then the show fades and you hit a brick wall If you39re dependent on anything outside your own self like other people substances successamp8230 you lose your sense of your own valuequotAfter Melrose Daphne admits she recessed into quietude fears and relationships I pulled back and became a private person quotI39m a triple Scorpioquot she laughs quotand it panicked me to be out there in publicquot Four years ago she discovered private Buddhist meditation retreats and quotlearned to truly be with myselfquot Daphne spent nine days in total silent meditation and says quotit39s the most powerfully shifting thing I39ve ever done It was nine days of diligent practice being with myself I faced my fears of success of relationships and of love When you finally face your fears you are free of them There39s nothing in the world I need to hide from againquotIn Beautiful People Daphne plays Lynn Kerr a mother of two girls whose husband has left her for another woman Her teen daughter Sarah Foret receives a scholarship to attend a prestigious private New York City high school and her older daughter emerging star Torrey DeVitto wants to follow a modeling career so the family packs up and moves to Manhattan from New Mexico quotI can identify with the storylines because the show is all about facing fears and learning to overcome themquot Daphne explains quotThe show is wonderfully written by Michael Rauch who went to a private New York City school and experienced the issues the girls confront We39re not avoiding controversial issues like drugs eating disorders sex and relationships We39re exploring all the rawness absurdities and humor of real lifequotDaphne has always been private about her personal life even with her parents quotMy mom was sarcastic about menquot says Daphne quotShe would tell me Adam was the rough draft and Eve was the final product And she39d say 39a woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle39 She was a feminist minister an earth mom who wore a bra only on Sundays for servicesquot Daphne laughs Daphne39s dad left home when she was six and she and her mom moved from Northern California to Vermont Daphne says she quotwas afraid of men I had crushes from afarquotHer first boyfriend was in college at UCLA where she dated actor Laurence Olivier39s son Richard but then quotI started dating older men and I would fall in love with themquot Is there a father complex I asked quotDuh Yeah I knew it but I was still attracted to them They were smart and I thought they could teach me about lifequot She kept her personal life so private that when she visited her dad in northern California several years ago she brought her good friend a massage therapist to dinner quotShe has arms like a football player and some tattoos My dad took me aside and said 39Daphne no matter what the answer is I39ll love you Are you gay39 I was shocked I adore men and I was actually seeing a big rock star at the time but I39ve always been discreetquotquotActuallyquot she adds thoughtfully quotit was probably more than being discreet My mother was a 3960s feminist and believed you don39t do things for men But there39s a difference between sexism and comfort with sexuality Being in the public eye I39ve been so covered up from fear of being used and an insecurity with my body No more I39m comfortable with being sexual and being true to my nature I took lap dance lessons recently and it was wonderful funquotDaphne tells the story of her early modeling days when she was asked to lose five pounds for a photo shoot and lost ten instead only to be told she was too thin quotEverybody39s body weight goes up and down Your body tells you what39s going on emotionally and mentally You can39t always fit into the smaller size without a high pricequotDaphne considers herself a quotlate bloomerquot but realizes now quotbeing a late bloomer is a problem when you decide at 40 you want to have childrenquot On the advice of a friend she is exploring the possibility of freezing her eggs and hopes the right man will come along soon quotI have the idea that you meet someone and if you decide to be together you work at the relationship and hope it continues to be successful When you put two complex people together it becomes more complexquotWhen we met for Lunch at Michael39s Daphne had just flown in from Puerto Rico where she was raising awareness and funds for Robert F Kennedy Jr39s Waterkeeper Alliance Ironically her friend Kerry Kennedy who was also at the event was dining near us at Michael39s as were several of Daphne39s friends from different eras and industry notables including her former agent Ron Meyer now head of Universal Studios John Sykes of MTV Networks Henry Schleiff of CourtTV writer Ken Auletta Nina Link William Lauder Katherine Oliver and Shelly Ross of ABCDaphne showed off a large scrape on her knee she sustained during an aggressive Kennedystyle soccer game and she offered an impassioned plea for greater respect toward our natural resources quotThe planet does nothing but support us and we are constantly committing crimes against naturequot She feels especially strongly about mercury poisoning caused by environmental damage to rivers and oceans Daphne hasn39t eaten meat since the mid1980s and now has foregone fish as well quotOne of every six women of child bearing age is toxic with mercury poisoning and it is doing damage to babiesquot she says passionately quotI was having memory losses my hands would cramp my hair was falling out and I was having chills on summer days I had a heavy metal blood test which most doctors don39t include in normal tests and I had mercury poisoning from the amount of fish I was eating I thought the issues were in the ozone or in rivers or the Amazon It didn39t occur to me my own bloodstream was poisoned The problem was not in tuna boats but in my own bodyquot She urges people to check out wwwwaterkeeperorg and wwwnrdcorgDaphne is proud of the work she Sarah and Torrey are doing on Beautiful People and is quotfocused on how I can take my talents and interests and make the best use of them We39re dealing with real issues on the showquot she says quotThis is not a Brady Bunch view of the worldquotTo contact Daphne Zuniga write to contactmediavillagecom

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Beautiful People's Daphne Zuniga: Facing Her Fears and Ready to Fall in Love

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