The ice blond in the red dress was going to cause an accident. Forget cellphones or spilled coffee causing distractions, drivers speeding through Hollywood last year had their gazes pulled off the road by a towering Last Supper-style billboard in which the centre point wasn't a doomed Jesus, but a celestial goddess.
In a town attuned to glamour, the iconic image of Tricia Helfer's Cylon Number Six character that transcended her role on the popular Battlestar Galactica TV series proved she had arrived in Hollywood with all the powerful charisma of a celebrity hitting her stride.
Often cast as "beautiful, but tough," the 35-year-old screen queen from Donalda, Alberta rides a Harley, has legions of fans and boasts a February 2007 Playboy cover that would make even Helen of Troy book emergency Botox. Daring to go where so many former cover girls have fallen on their six-inch heels, Tricia jettisoned a successful 10-year career as a supermodel and set her sights on Hollywood in 2001. "It was daunting, to say the least," she recalls. "I knew no one in L.A. and I had no acting credits." Undeterred by "walk-by-in-a-bikini" auditions, Tricia fought the model-turned-actor stereotype and emerged as a scene-stealing artist. "Of course, it was a big challenge," she admits. "But I guess I thrive on challenges. I don't like when things are too easy, then the rewards don't seem earned."
The many incarnations of her Cylon Number Six character challenged her enough that she is continuing that role in the upcoming Battlestar Galactica movie, The Plan, which will be released on DVD on October 27 and on the SyFy channel in November. She's also set to make new fans on a grander scale when she guest stars as a brainiac in need of a bodyguard on Fox's much-anticipated action series, Human Target, set to air in January. Sought on both sides of the 49th parallel, Tricia also recently played the starring role in a pilot entitled The Dealership, co-created by Calgary's award-winning writer and showrunner, Andrew Wreggitt.
Having portrayed Farrah Fawcett in the 2004 TV movie Behind the Camera: The Unauthorized Story of Charlie's Angels, Tricia has an idea of what it might be like to be a household name. But she's not just another pin-up girl; those who work with her discover there's plenty of grit under the gloss. "Boy, she knows how to work," observes Wreggitt. "She's a very dedicated person."
More than just commitment, successful actors need that elusive "X-factor," something Wreggitt believes Tricia has. "When you see Battlestar, she's a presence every time she's on screen. You can't help but be drawn to her ... Yet when you talk to her, she's a real sweetheart, a very down-to-earth person."
Tricia might have ended up just another pretty face around Holly-wood but for her emotional range, professionalism and feet-on-the-ground realness, which have their roots in her farm girl upbringing.
Tricia was born on April 11, 1974, during a Donalda spring that flooded the local bridge and left her in the hospital with jaundice until the water receded and her mother could take her home. "That's the world I was born into," she explains - a world that for Tricia seemed to be dominated by wheat and weather. The third of four daughters in a grain-farming family, Tricia notes: "My parents are very hard workers, and my grandparents are very hard workers - so you know we definitely had to work."
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