Cathy Lee Crosby seeks new fields to conquer

Press, 28 May 1984, Page 19

Cathy Lee Crosby seeks new fields to conquer

BOB WISEHART,

By

Newhouse News Service New Orleans A job that requires cavorting with a tarantula or a frog that meows like a cat has its moments, but for Cathy Lee Crosby it is time to move on. Miss Crosby is one of the trio of hosts of/“That’s Incredible,” A.B.C.’s weekly exercise in geek chic. She is dutifully suffering through an interview in a New Orleans hotel suite, plugging the show and, not incidentally, herself. Miss Crosby, aged 34, hates interviews and says she has been burned more than once. At best, she laments, ‘Tm so boring. I always sound so Pollyanna and apple pie and it looks so stupid in print.” In a bright turquoise dress with a ragged, up-and-down hem that was more up than down, however she looks, it is not boring. Miss Crosby recently ended a year when she did absolutely nothing to publicise herself, unheard of for a TV personality who yearns to become an honest-to-goodness actress. ‘I wanted to pull back from the celebrity thing,” she says. “It’s like a wheel, it starts rolling and it’s hard to get off ... There’s no time for anything else.”

But now she is playing the good soldier for Incredible!” New Orleans was the last stop in a four-city, four-day tour to find “the most incredible citizen” in each city. The feature is slated for next season, if there is one. Miss Crosby would not mind if it sank. “My contract has one more year to run, but the show isn’t doing as well as it was. It’s been nice and you can’t beat the exposure, but it’s not what I want to do now.” You can’t beat the hours either. “That’s Incredible” requires only 30 days a year from Miss Crosby and her fellow hosts, Fran Tarkenton and John Davidson. Miss Crosby, who has been studying acting, is gunning for TV movies, theatrical films, her own series and maybe all three. Reverting to Hollywood jargon, she brags that on her return to Los Angeles she

will “take a creative meeting” with Aaron Spelling, the superstar producer who 'owns half of A.B.C.’s primetime line-up. Miss Crosby’s first role was a small part on “Marcus Welby” years ago (“I caught VJ)., but only on the show,” she giggles) after a short but eye-catching modelling career that financed her degree from the University of Southern California. Her aim is to be regarded as someone who can handle roles that require more than looking interested with a guest on “That’s Incredible!” who catches arrows with his teeth. Though she has made six low-budget films and appeared in two mini-series, it is suggested that the public does not think of her as an actress. As an answer, she cites her friend, Cher, who metamorphoed from a human hood ornament into a serious actress thanks to her performance in “Silkwood.” “Cher tried for eight years and couldn’t even get an agent,” says Miss Crosby. “She kept saying, ‘I can do this’ or ‘I can do that’ and everybody laughed at her. “Well,” she sniffs, “they’re not laughing now.” Miss Crosby has read for. several films recently and lost every one, but she is convinced that one day she will win. “The last one was for a film with Kris Kristofferson and Treat Williams,” she says. “It came down to me and Tess Harper (‘Celebrity’ and ‘Tender Mercies’). They went with Tess and I don’t blame them. But I’m getting close.” Miss Crosby has an unusual problem. Many attractive women in show business fight the image of the brainless bimbo, but Miss Crosby is known to be no dummy and has a long history in athletics. She was nationally ranked in tennis at the age of 19 and was getting physical when the rest of the country was sitting on its flab. She has. also worked for several charities, was responsible for the “Get high on yourself’ anti-drug campaign, and has been associated with the Special Olympics for eight years.

Every so often, Miss Crosby does something dramatic to remind the world she possesses the array of options associated with attractive women. The latest involved 20 hours of interviews and six weeks of photograph sessions as the semi-nude subject of “One Woman” magazine, which she crows has sold 350,000 copies. Miss Crosby is enormously pleased with the magazine and throws copies around like confetti. The reaction, she says, has been “all positive.” “I can be all kinds of things that people don’t know I can be. I can be glamorous or grubby, sexy or the girl next door. “What I’ve never been is a blonde bimbo,” she concludes. “Certainly not to myself.”