"I'm daring," says Deborah Driggs. "I'm outgoing, edgy - an explorer. There's not a lot I haven't done, but if you have any ideas, try me." Miss March hails from sunny California, where new ideas are a dime a dozen. While her schoolmates - male and female alike - at Orange County's Saddleback Colleg
...e were bleaching their hair to match the local beachin' ideal, she stubbornly remained a brunette. "This is my virgin hair," she says, shaking it over her shoulders. Deborah Driggs, no slave to fashion, makes her own rules. She spent her formative years as a junior figure skater, wowing the crowds at ice palaces throughout the Los Angeles Basin. She remembers waking up at 4 a.m. and practicing until 7:30, then racing to school, changing her clothes in the back seat of her mother's car. "Mom would tell me when a truck was coming, so I could cover up." A potential champion, she quit skating when she was still a teen. No discipline could hold her for long. At first, she says, she searched for an outlet for the energy she had put into skating competition. "When something that used to take up all your time stops, you have to search for something new," says Deborah. "I did a little drinking. I even tried drugs. That wasn't for me. So I decided to go all out for life." Give the woman a ten. She may not be as famous as Katarina Witt - yet --but Miss March has cornered the market in style points. As a cheerleader ("song leader") at Saddleback College, she sang her heart out for the Gauchos, who made her homecoming queen in 1983. After college, Miss March took the advice of dozens of friends and resolved to concentrate on modeling. Her first job, a TV ad for a Japanese coffee creamer called Creep Christy, paid $700 a day. "I said to myself, 'I think I can stand this.' " Modeling built her bank account; ambition fueled her drive to take up acting. Now a familiar face in L.A., she does compulsories, Hollywood style - every night, she digs angst out of her soul in acting classes. "I don't want to sound like every other young actor," she says (Deborah thinks the distinction between "actor" and "actress" is sexist), "and say I am going to win an Oscar. I mean, I know I've got a lot of work ahead of me. But you never know if you don't try, right?" Deborah Driggs is outgoing, edgy, curious - and determined. She knows there are thousands of young beauties in Hollywood angling for the same acting jobs she wants. No matter. All a woman can do is her best. "I'm just intense enough to think that if you have it inside you - the need to perform - good things can happen." Miss March says she is between relationships this year. She broke off an engagement in February 1989 - "That was a tough Valentine's Day" - and has not had a steady man since. "I know Prince Charming is going to ride up on his Harley someday," she says. "When he does, I'll be ready." She has an idea of what her prince will be like. He'll have a fast motorcycle, for one thing. Reservations at a four-star hotel in San Francisco, for another. He will be gentlemanly and funny. And an amateur masseur. After that, anything goes. "Surprise me. I like to be blown away. Nothing ordinary. Something to get your engine going." Advice for student princes: "Try something new. Take me away. All of a sudden - boom! - I'm yours." This month, she charms millions of Playboy readers. Next year, the world.
