Jenna Elfman

Jennifer Mary "Jenna" Elfman (born September 30, 1971) is an American television and film actress. She is best known for her roles as Dharma Freedom Finkelstein Montgomery on the 1997 to 2002 American television sitcom Dharma & Greg and as Anna Riley in the 2000 feature film Keeping the Faith. --- Elfman was born Jennifer Mary Butala in Los Angeles, California, the youngest of three children, to Sue (Grace) Butala, a homemaker, and Richard Wayne Butala, a Hughes Aircraft executive. Her father's younger brother, Elfman's uncle, is Tony Butala, lead singer since 1958 of the American vocal trio The Lettermen. She is of Croatian ancestry on her father's side and was raised Roman Catholic. Taking ballet classes since the age of five, Elfman became a classically trained ballet dancer and attended high school at the Los Angeles County High School for the Arts. She then attended college at California State University, Northridge (CSUN). Elfman began her professional career as a dancer, appearing in the music video for "Halo", a song by Depeche Mode from the 1990 album Violator, a video that was exclusively included on the band's 1990 music video compilation Strange Too. After appearing in numerous national television commercials, most notably as the girl in the Hondaad who said "Regular or Decaf?", Elfman landed her first principal cast acting role on the short-lived 1996 American sitcom entitled Townies on ABC. Although the show didn't catch on with viewers, it did impress critics, particularly the performances of Elfman and co-star Lauren Graham. Soon after, 20th Century Fox began talking to Elfman about developing her own sitcom. Elfman thus started her five-year run as Dharma Freedom Finkelstein Montgomery in the American comedy series Dharma & Greg on ABC.