The Thriller of It All

There have been dozens of Playmate success stories, but the lady at the top of this page is the one to beat this season. Since she graced our June 1980 centerfold, multitalented Ola Ray has appeared in three feature films and several television commercials and, as the "Classy Curl" girl, has promoted that Johnson Products hair preparation (her face is on the box). But it's her performance as Michael Jackson's terrified girlfriend in his wildly popular rock video Thriller that has finally made Miss Ray's face as familiar to boogieing middle America as it is to her admiring Playboy fans. Although we've checked in with Ola a couple of times over the past few years, usually via The World of Playboy, her appearance in the lavishly produced Thriller (directed by John Landis, who brought you National Lampoon's Animal House, The Blues Brothers and Trading Places) was cause for a longer interview.

Finding Ola at home was the hardest part. We called for a week before we finally made contact. She had just come in and was out of breath. "I just finished an 'It Does Your Body Good' milk commercial," she said, and laughed. "I'm a certified all-American girl now, since all-American girls drink milk." In case you're a milk lover, or just an Ola Ray lover, you can recognize this commercial by her thumbnail description: "It's a Flashdance-style exercise scene with different shots of me and two other girls working on a Nautilus machine and doing aerobics. We work up a sweat, go to the locker room, put on our warm-up jackets and go get glasses of milk. I take a couple of sips and smile at my girlfriend, who takes a big gulp and smiles back." (If you're like us, you'll like the working-up-a-sweat part best.)

We asked Ola to give us a brief rundown of her career highlights thus far, including minireviews of some of the stars with whom she has worked. "I played one of the callgirls in Night Shift, with Henry Winkler. He was great, laughing and joking with us all the time. I told him I wanted a bigger part and he said, 'Don't worry, your time will come.' I had a lot of fun working with him. I had a dance scene beside Eddie Murphy in 48 HRS.--just a tiny part, but I enjoyed it. Eddie is basically a nice person and a very funny guy, but he can also be kind of obnoxious at times. I think that'll change as he gets older. I also played the roommate of Charles Bronson's daughter in Ten to Midnight. We were nurses sharing an apartment. I got killed in the shower, à la Psycho, stabbed and screaming my guts out. John Landis got a clip of that scene and decided that I'd fit the part of Michael's girlfriend in Thriller." Ahh, yes, Thriller. And the experience of spending two weeks on the set with America's most reclusive (and famous) rock star. The obvious question: Was there any electricity between you two? "Oh, no, but don't make any assumptions out of that about Michael's sexuality. I've known plenty of homosexuals, but Michael doesn't seem like any of them. If anything, he just doesn't deal with sex at all. That's probably due to his being a Jehovah's Witness. They're very strict. My woman's intuition tells me Michael is basically a very conventional guy who will, when he meets the right girl, settle down and have a conventional family life. He's a very simple, honest person. I was worried that when he found out that I'd been a Playmate, he wouldn't want me in Thriller, because of his religious beliefs. But when John Landis told him, he just asked, 'Well, is she a nice girl?' Landis said I was, and that was good enough for Michael."

Finally, we asked Ola to describe her favorite fantasy. "To be in a black nighttime soap opera, like a black Dynasty. It would have Billy Dee Williams as the Blake Carrington character and Diana Ross as Alexis. I'd play the Fallon character, and I'd have two lovers, Michael Jackson and Rick Springfield. Don't be surprised if somebody does it. I have a lot of faith in my ideas. And so far, most of my dreams have come true." Out of a nightmare like Thriller, sweet dreams can, indeed, come true. Just ask Ola Ray.