At first glance the thin and perfectly coiffed woman with the "I don't knowwho I'm supposed to be meeting" expression looks like just another one of the beautiful people seen daily in West Hollywood's trendy Sunset Plaza. But the ringlet curls, steely glare and flawless complexion could belong to only one person.

Yes, Virigina, you are in the right place.

Coming off a somewhat harrowing day, which started with a 5am call to the set, Dominique Jennings, who plays Sunset Beach's scheming Virginia Harrison, greets this stranger with a smile and a sigh. Then comes a rather rapid staccato about a wild-goose chase on which her friend, who has recently given birth, sent her that day. It included nursing bras and baby formula - the stuff that great monologues are made of. And this was one of them. Telling the stroy, Jennings is characteristically animated, punctuating key points with head shakes and hand gestures. While passerby might have thought she was ranting, in reality she is simply cleansing.

This is a woman who prefers the simple life. But it appears simplicity is something has has to work at. Her life has been a series of adventures - beginning in Stockholm, Sweden, where she was born. "I remember some things abou it, like and amusement park I used to go to, and that it was always light out when I went to bed. And, oh yes, I remember it could get a little chilly."

Jenning's memories about her homeland are a bit vague because she left Sweden and moved to Los Angeles with her father, acclaimed artist and musician, Prophet, when she was 6. It was nearly three years after her mother had died. "I have one memory of her - it's cute," she says before you can say "aw." "I remember my mom and my dad tickling me as I ran back and forth between them."

These days Jennings spends most of her time dashing back and forth between her West Hollywood digs and the Sunset set in Burbank. Since her arrival, Jennings, who was initially hired for only 10 episodes but was offered a three-year contract after her first day, has been igniting the screen - not to mention the cabin of on-screen love Michael, the man who is trying to get away.

"I actually went in and auditioned for another role, and then I didn't heart anything," says Jennings, who's road to the Beach was paved with roles in such films as Seven and Die Hard 2, guest spots on plethora of sitcoms and the voice of Wanda on HBO's animated adult series, Spawn. She can currently be seen in the "Got Milk?" ads. "I thought I wasn't right for the part. I found out I was working two days later. It's always when you're not expecting it that things happen."

And Jennings currently wasn't expecting to become "the bitch of the beach," but enjoys the fact that Virginia has an edge - something she feels is a rarity for black characters in daytime.

"She has depth," she says of Virigina, a single mother from South Central L.A., who is trying to make a better life for her son while making life miserable for Michael and Vanessa. "It's been an interesting ride because Virginia didn't start out like that. I can't really think of any black woman playing this kind of role in daytime right now. It's fun, but sometimes I have to just snap out of it."

A an undercover comedian, Jennings gets a kick out of donning a padded body suit and "whacked-out" wig when Virginia's pretending to be a nurse and Vanessa's mother's hospital. "The suit is a trip," the actress says of her Nurse Jones getup, which adds 30 pounds to her reed-thin frame. "It's really old and itchy, and it's hard to tell I have it on with the nurse's uniform, because the costume is so boxy. It's not so much heavy as it is hot. And the wig is just kind of out there."

Even without the wig and the fat suit it's easy to see the differences between Jennings and Virginia. Jennings is more a renaissance woman that girl from da "hood" thanks to an early exposure to the arts. She loves her craft, painting, movies, music, and making jewelry. And her creativity knows no limits. She once substituted her sock for tissue when she and a friend got misty-eyed watching Good Will Hunting.

"I knew somehow I would end up involved in the arts because they always surrounded me," says Jennings, who at 7 was a guest artist in one of her father's shows (she sold three paintings). "If it wasn't music, it was my father's friends. It was a different world, kind of wild. It gave me an insight into a lot of stuff as a child. I learned things that a lot of children at my age didn't."

Jenning's notes that her father is her biggest fan. "He sits there and screams at the TV now," she says with a laugh. "It's very scary. He watches every single day. He's hooked."

Hooked is the opposite of Jennings' initial feelings for the dramatic arts. "I was an introverted kid and I really didn't like acting," says the actress who made her first TV appearance at age 9 with Richard Pryor on Sesame Street. "After I did that Sesame Street, this agent came out of the sky and I started going out on things. I was once up for something that was like the black Waltons, but it was never made. I remember I wasn't sad at all. I did some commercials and then I stopped. I didn't get back into it until high school."

Recently Jennings has reacquainted herself with another passion - music. "I'm working on some things and trying to make the right connections," the aspiring singer says. "I love music. One of the things I really splurged on was a serious system with speakers built into the walls and whole thing. I'm writing it off as R&D - research and development. I gotta have my sounds."

After our quick bite and some loose chat off the record about friends who demand too much and the downside of fame, it seemed a good time to share a confession of my own. Heck, I wouldn't be offended if someone thought I looked like Shari Belafonte. But you never know.

"That's so weird that you would say tha," Jennings says. "I used to get that alot. Her husband works on the show!" Does Sam Behrens (Gregory) ever get confused? "No, not even. But the other day the makeup guy said, 'Oh girl, you are Whitney!' I was like: I just gotta be me today, OK?"

What can I say - she's a woman of many talents and faces.