Tawny Kitaen has died

Cause unknown. Age 59.

Bachelor Party wouldn’t have been the same without you, Tawny. Neither would have all those music videos.

Wow, hard to believe she was 59 but then I knew she was actually older than me, but it doesn’t seem like she should be. Still far too young too die.

Besides Bachelor Party and the Whitesnake videos she was the receptionist on The New WKRP in Cincinnati and the star of the Perils of Gwendoline in the Land of the Yik-Yak.

Do you remember when got in trouble for spousal abuse? She was married to Chuck Finley the baseball pitcher and they got into an argument and she dropped him with several high kicks to the face with high heeled shoes on, waif-fu style. I’m probably misremembering the details a little.

She played DJ Mona Loveland. The receptionist was “Ronnie Lee”, played by Wendy Davis, then “Nancy Braithwaite”, played by Marla Rubinoff.

Tawny shifted to reality tv shows a few years ago. She recently appeared on Botched a show about bad plastic surgery.

I remember her from the four Hercules TV movies. She played his wife Deianeira. Unfortunately that character was killed off for the TV series. A weekly recurring role could have revived Tawny’s career.

As someone who “came of age” during the mid to late 80s, it was her roles in Witchboard and Crystal Heart that affected me the most, but I remember her most vividly as “the girl in the Whitesnake” videos.

Maybe not an original, but she was certainly a standout.

At the time of the Kitaen-Finley incident in spring 2002, the White Sox had a “wacky DJ” named Joe Stephen who would prance around the field before the game and during inning breaks, and do promotions and play songs and try to get the crowd riled up. On April 16, 2002 Finley pitched against the White Sox, so Stephen had Here I Go Again, with video starring Kitaen, played just before Finley took the mound.

The ploy worked, as Finley was shelled for nine runs in the second inning. But afterward the White Sox developed a conscience and fired Stephen, the only man to lose his job because of a Whitesnake video.

I’m a bit confused; I’m certain there was a porn actress with the same (or very similar) screen name but I can’t find any cites for this. Is this dain bramage on my part?

This one has much gratuitous nudity. Not porn, though.