Brinke Stevens

Early life

Stevens was born in San Diego and grew up in Crest, California. She is of German and Mongolian descent and her parents are Charles Brinkman II, an aircraft riveter, and Lorraine Brinkman.

Stevens has studied several foreign languages, including Esperanto, and gained a Bachelor of Science in Biology and Psychology from San Diego State University and a Master of Science in Marine Biology from Scripps Institution of Oceanography, La Jolla, California. Initially intending to study dolphin communication, she was instead tossed out of Scripps for doing "forbidden research" on dolphin communication, largely to do with the Navy's use of dolphins in undersea weapons research at the time.

In 1974, Stevens attended San Diego Comic Con wearing a Vampirella costume and won first place in their first Masquerade Ball. She was part of running the masquerade at Comic Con for years after her win. Forrest J Ackerman, the creator of Vampirella, was in attendance in 1974 and posed with Stevens for photographs. They became friends and, according to Stevens "Forry and his wife, Wendayne, soon became like my god parents." Photographer Dan Golden later saw a photograph of Stevens in the Vampirella costume while visiting Ackerman's house, leading to him hiring her for a non-speaking role in her first student film, Zyzak is King (1980), and later photographing her for the cover of the first issue of Femme Fatales (1992).

In 1980, Stevens married her college sweetheart Dave Stevens. They moved to Los Angeles where he worked as a storyboard artist on Raiders of the Lost Ark. The marriage ended in divorce after just six months.

Stevens attributes her short marriage to Dave Stevens and her meeting with Ackerman at Comic Con to eventually leading to her acting career, saying "If not for Forry, I might still be in San Diego working as a scientist. If [I] hadn't gotten married [...] I would never have moved to Hollywood in the first place."

Career

While going to a modeling assignment, Stevens was discovered by accident by a producer who cast her in a film as an extra. While leaving a modeling agency, she stopped by an office door to look at film posters on the walls. The occupant, Jacob Bressler, told her to enter and asked for her portfolio. On the basis of that, he cast her in an uncredited, non-speaking role in ...All the Marbles (1981). Stevens' first speaking role was as Linda in The Slumber Party Massacre (1982).

Stevens has appeared in more than 100 feature films, primarily in the horror, science fiction, and fantasy film genres. From her long list of acting credits, she has gained notoriety as a scream queen, to the extent that she was once the subject of a Jeopardy! answer: "Brinke Stevens is known by this semi-rhyming title." (Question: What is a Scream Queen?). The Jeopardy! question was asked during the Scripps Institution of Oceanography special.

In addition to acting, Stevens has co-written a number of screenplays, co-produced two documentaries, and served as an onset decorator. In one of her scripts, Dr. Horror's Erotic House of Idiots, Stevens pokes fun at the B-Movie industry and spoofs some of her own films.

Stevens portrayed Julie Quinn, mother of serial killer Wayne Montgomery, in the 2007 horror film Head Case. This was the first time she had ever acted in an improvisational film. She reprised her role in the three sequels, 2009's The Ritual, 2010's Post-Mortem, and 2013's Head Cases: Serial Killers in the Delaware Valley.

In 1995, a 3 part comics series 'Brinke of Destruction' was co-written by Todd A Kaylor and Brinke for 'High Top Publications'.

Brinke Stevens is depicted in the horror novel, Bad Moon Rising, the third installment of Jonathan Maberry's "Pine Deep" trilogy, alongside Jim O'Rear, Tom Savini, and Debbie Rochon, published in 2008.

Brinke Stevens appeared on the 2009 cover of the popular pulp movie magazine Mondo Cult.

More recently she has appeared in a 2009 documentary Pretty Bloody: The Women of Horror and appeared in the 2013 remake of Die Sister, Die!.

Personal life

Stevens is an inactive member of Mensa.

During the early 1990s Stevens was engaged to marry television talk show Host and Santa Barbara restaurateur, Ken Boxer. They never married but remain lifelong friends.