Ami Dolenz is an American retired actress.
Dolenz was born in Burbank, California, into a show business family. She is the daughter of Micky Dolenz of the 1960s group the Monkees, and British television presenter Samantha Juste.[1] Her paternal grandparents were the film actors George Dolenz and Janelle Johnson.[2]
At age 15, Dolenz won a junior talent contest and decided to become an actress. She dropped out of high school and began appearing in roles on various television series.[2] One of her first acting roles was in the television movie The Children of Times Square, followed by a two-episode stint on Growing Pains. In 1987, she had a small role in the comedy Can't Buy Me Love. Later that year, she landed the role of Melissa McKee in the long-running soap opera General Hospital; the role garnered critical attention for Dolenz and she earned two nominations (in 1988 and 1989, respectively) for a Young Artist Award.[3]
After leaving General Hospital in 1989, Dolenz landed a co-starring role opposite Tony Danza in She's Out of Control. The following year, she portrayed Sloane Peterson in Ferris Bueller, a television sitcom based on Ferris Bueller's Day Off, which lasted only thirteen episodes and was cancelled in 1991.[4] After its demise, Dolenz starred in Children of the Night and then had the lead role in 1992's Miracle Beach.[5]
Throughout the 1990s, Dolenz continued to appear in films and television, including Witchboard 2: The Devil's Doorway; Pumpkinhead II: Blood Wings; Murder, She Wrote; Wake, Rattle and Roll; Saved by the Bell: The College Years; Demolition University; Pacific Blue; and Teen Angel. In 1998, she voiced a character for the children's show The Secret Files of the Spy Dogs. After a four-year hiatus from acting, Dolenz returned in the independent film Mr. Id, in a co-starring role with Steve Parlavecchio. In 2007, she appeared in the film Even If, which she also produced.
On August 10, 2002, Dolenz married actor and martial artist Jerry Trimble.[6]
In addition to acting, Dolenz and her husband manage KidPix Productions, a company that stages movie shoots as birthday parties for children. She also performs with the Write Act Repertory Theatre,[7] and owns Bluebell Boutique, an online custom jewelry shop that she previously co-owned and operated with her late mother.[8]