Julie Michelle McCullough

From the cover of Playboy in 1986 to the telling jokes on stage, Julie McCullough has had one very interesting journey. Julie grew up a military brat—moving from Hawaii, Texas, Canada, and Italy because of her father’s career in the Marine Corps. “It bothered me when I was younger, but as I look back, I appreciate it, because it taught me how to get along with different types of people,” says the all-natural blonde. “If you make good friends, you never lose them.” However, Julie learned the hard way that once you achieve success, people will try to tear you down and take it away from you. The Honolulu-born, Texas-raised beauty was thrilled to learn that she was our Playmate of the Month and our cover girl –but her local pastor wasn’t too pleased. The pastor from one of her hometowns, Allen, TX, decided he needed to inform his entire congregation about Julie’s Playboy spread by dedicating a sermon to her where he said the easiest thing to do would be to jump on Julie. “I think it's the best publicity she could get,” said her stepfather about it at the time. No publicity is ever bad publicity —a fact that Miss February 1986 quickly came to realize, especially after Hollywood executives were offering her acting jobs. “The best job would be to become an actress, because you can be anything you want to be –or at least act like it,” says hazel-eyed Julie. “Success, to me, is being happy at what I do.” Nothing made voluptuous Julie happier than acting on such hit shows as Who’s The Boss?, The Golden Girls and Beverly Hills 90210 but, true fame came her way when she played Julie Costello, Kirk Cameron’s love interest in Growing Pains. While her nanny character received rave reviews and hate mail from jealous teenage girls who thought the love between her and Kirk was real, Miss McCullough was infamously let go from the show. She has widely speculated that the reason behind the decision was because of Kirk’s newfound Evangelical Christian faith, which in his mind, clashed with having a Playmate costar. That wasn’t enough to dim Julie’s bright career—she transformed her resentment into comedy which has made her quite successful. “It's important to me to be able to achieve something on my own,” says the Playmate. “I don't necessarily have to be rich. All through high school, I worked as a grocery-store checker. I like knowing that whatever money I have, I’ve earned. I don't like people giving me things.” Unless, they’re giving her the title Miss February 1986 which she did very well earn.