OVERALL RATING: 80
Lucy Lawless is like a man's fantasy and nightmare come to life. On one hand, you have an intimidating six-foot-tall beauty who can just as easily break you in two as she could kiss you. On the other hand, you have a fun-loving, starry-eyed, talented woman who would unselfishly try to entertain you than to have the focus on herself. It's this polar opposite character that has won her fans from Alaska to Uganda as she plays Xena, on Xena: Warrior Princess.
PERSONALITY: 87
Don't let her menacing persona fool you, Lucy Lawless is one the nicest people in the acting biz today. It helps that half the time - due to her lengthy filming schedule - she carries around a three-foot sword to ensure that people are nice to her. She's loved by the people she works with. Alright, enough gushing, we are getting an ulcer.
BEAUTY: 78
At almost six-feet-tall, this beauty queen from New Zealand can just as easily body slam you as seduce you with her blue eyes. We'd prefer the latter of course.
INTELLIGENCE: 78
She tried going to university for a while, but felt stifled, which led her on a journey that eventually introduced her to acting and a guest spot on The Adventures of Hercules. Her dropping out of school leading her to worldwide fame might have been dumb luck, but Lucy deserves credit for orchestrating her career rise.
ATTRACTIVENESS: 86
Maybe it's the though of her in her leather barbarian Xena outfit, but we find that Lucy Lawless belongs high up on the sexiness scale. Very high up.
CAREER STATUS: 73
Lucy Lawless proved she was more than just agile with a sword when she starred on Broadway with Rosie O'Donnell in Grease. Not only was her acting applauded, but her singing got rave reviews too. You know someone's career is going well when they start making dolls of you.
TALENT: 76
Talent? It's there, probably untapped. We're nice guys, we'll give her the benefit of the doubt and assume she a raw talent waiting for a project to show off her skills. All kidding aside, she has received critical acclaim for several non-Xena performances, and hopes to take on some serious roles in the near future.
FASHION SENSE: 71
Did we mention we liked the leather Xena outfit (or mini-outfit)? Though it's not required in her contract that Lucy must wear the outfit 100% of time, we still think there should be a law. After all, how many times has the paparazzi caught her wearing pink jogging pants, the ultimate fashion faux pas?
ESSENTIAL INFORMATION
WHY WE CHOSE HER?
She showed up at our door with her henchman demanding to be featured, while wielding a samurai sword? How could we not satisfy her wish?
BIOGRAPHY:
Lucy Lawless was born on March 29, 1968. Lucy was very much a tomboy up to the age of eight, following in the footsteps of her four older brothers. She went to a public school for two years before attending convent schools. She started an early career in acting by appearing in numerous musicals and plays throughout her high school years.
With dark black hair, intense blue eyes and measuring almost six feet tall, Lawless is the fifth of seven children and the oldest girl in her family. Her father, who became mayor of Mt. Albert the year Lucy was born, is currently Chairman of Finance for Auckland City.
At the age of 15, Lucy attended an opera with her mother in France. Soon afterwards, she began taking opera classes that she later quit. She later developed a passion for singing, which she still has.
After her graduation at 17, she attended Auckland University for a short time before wanderlust set in. Lucy left for Europe "to go grape-picking on the Rhine." When she ran out of money, she took off for Australia and signed on with a gold-mining company operating in Kalgoorlie. She was then relocated to a tiny mining camp, two hours away from any form of civilization. One of the very few women miners on the workplace, Lucy did the same hard work as the men - digging, mapping the ground, driving trucks, and pushing huge core samples of earth through a diamond saw.
Lucy married in Australia and returned to Auckland shortly thereafter where her daughter Daisy, now eight years old, was born. With renewed determination to pursue a career in acting, she began doing television commercials before landing her first real acting job at age 20 with a comedy troupe on television called Funny Business.
Lucy later moved to Vancouver, Canada, for eight months to study drama at the William Davis Center for Actors Study. When she returned to New Zealand in early 1992, she accepted a job as the co-host for Air New Zealand Holiday, a travel magazine show broadcast in New Zealand and throughout Asia, which took her around the world.
Lawless first captivated the American audience with her portrayal of Xena in a three-episode arc of the hit series Hercules: The Legendary Journeys. She elicited such strong viewer response that the decision was made to create a spin-off called Xena: Warrior Princess.
Lawless sees the role of Xena as her first major breakthrough as an actress. She describes the character as "a woman as strong as any man or woman has ever been, who lives by her wits, but is also a fighter. She's a very human hero, who knows all about the darker side of human nature since she must battle it within herself every day."
Apart from great acting, Lawless also has an aptitude for languages and accents. She speaks English, German, French and some Italian, and has often worked on U.S. co-productions requiring a mid-American accent.
During September and October of 1997, Lucy made her Broadway debut when she took advantage of the opportunity to play the tough talking Betty Rizzo in Grease. The opportunity arose when Lucy, appearing on The Rosie O'Donnell Show, sang I'm An Old Cowhand. O'Donnell commented on her voice and their conversation drifted to the role of Rizzo. The producers of Grease saw Lucy on Rosie, they liked what they heard, and offered her the opportunity to star on Broadway as Rizzo. The rest, as they say, is history.
Lucy makes her home in Auckland, New Zealand. Divorced from Garth Lawless, Lucy and Garth now share custody of their daughter Daisy. Lucy became engaged to Xena: Warrior Princess executive producer Rob Tapert while in New York City in the Fall of 1997. The couple later married in Santa Monica, California on March 28, 1998.
What else do you need to know?
OUR SECRET WISH:
That Lucy's love of leather tops makes the kind of impact on women that Farrah Fawcett's haircut had on women in the 70's.
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