Apollonia

Born Patricia Kotero in 1959 in Santa Monica, California, the performer later christened Apollonia by Prince joined the ranks of female artists who gained visibility in the 1980s through ties to the Purple One. Her professional path opened in the late 1970s with modeling and acting jobs, one of which placed her on the police procedural CHiPS. The pivotal break arrived in 1984 when she secured the leading female role in Prince’s film Purple Rain; during that period he assigned her the stage name and she stepped in for Vanity within the vocal trio Vanity 6, appearing on screen as Apollonia 6.

The group registered a modest chart entry with “Sex Shooter,” yet Apollonia reached a wider audience through her duet with Prince on “Take Me with You,” featured on the movie’s soundtrack. After a disagreement concerning the trajectory of her work, the trio disbanded and she severed her professional link to Prince. Subsequent years brought parts in several low-profile pictures—she reportedly turned down an offer tied to the sequel Under the Cherry Moon—before she joined the cast of the nighttime soap Falcon Crest for the 1985–1986 season.

Her first solo album surfaced in 1988; although it blended R&B and dance material, the collection attracted little notice from listeners and quickly disappeared from stores. Throughout the following decade she sustained a lower-profile acting career that encompassed brief television appearances, small film roles, and the release of an exercise video. In 1997 she issued the bilingual album Stay with Me. Later she returned to education, earned a degree in filmmaking, launched her own production company, and concentrated much of her work on children’s programming.