Dana Plato's Real Name: Dana Michelle Strain

Quick answer: She was known as Dana Plato. TV Insider's biography says she was born Dana Michelle Strain on November 7, 1964, in Maywood, California, and was adopted as a baby by Dean and Kay Plato. A Library of Congress name record independently gives the birth name Dana Michelle Strain with the same date and city. The Los Angeles Times reported her death on May 8, 1999, at 34.

Real name and early life

TV Insider says she was born Dana Michelle Strain on November 7, 1964, in Maywood, California, to a 16-year-old mother, Linda Strain, who placed her for adoption. It says Dean and Kay Plato adopted her in June 1965 and raised her in the San Fernando Valley. The Library of Congress authority file records "birth name, Dana Michelle Strain, b. Nov. 7, 1964 in Maywood, Calif."

TV Insider says her adoptive mother saw early promise in her and that she appeared in more than 100 television commercials as a child. The Los Angeles Times obituary, by Myrna Oliver, independently says she had been acting since age 6 and appeared in hundreds of commercials and films in childhood.

Career highlights

Both sources identify her best-known role as Kimberly Drummond, the teenage daughter in the sitcom Diff'rent Strokes. TV Insider dates the series to 1978–1986 on NBC and ABC. The Times says she played the daughter of Conrad Bain's character, with Gary Coleman and Todd Bridges as his adopted sons, and that she was on the show from its start in 1978 until 1984, when her character left to study in Paris. TV Insider also lists the 1983 film High School U.S.A.

The Times says that later in her career she worked in low-budget films and in small theatres and dinner theatres, including a 1992 Las Vegas stage revue after treatment and roles in 1993 and 1995 productions. It says she spoke openly about past alcoholism.

Legal outcomes and death

The Times says she received two five-year probation sentences after pleading guilty in 1991 to robbing a Las Vegas video store and, in 1992, to forging a prescription. The New York Times reported the same two probation terms.

The Los Angeles Times says she died on Saturday, May 8, 1999, in Moore, Oklahoma, while visiting the parents of her fiancé, and that police there said the death "appears to be an accidental overdose" of prescription medication. The New York Times independently reported that police described an apparently accidental overdose. The Library of Congress record gives the date of death as May 8, 1999, in Moore. Her son survived her.

Name notes for searchers

People looking up Dana Plato or Dana Michelle Strain are looking for the same actress. Plato was the surname of her adoptive parents.