Yeah, yeah, yeah, you already know all about the bad boy of blackjack thing. Hey, someone's gotta talk shit on the blackjack tables and it might as well be me! But there are a few things you may not know about the guy people love to hate:

I grew up in Cleveland, Ohio and from an early age always loved playing games of skill. My Sicilian grandfather used to kick my ass at Rummy while talking smack, so I guess that's where it all started! Eventually I got good enough to beat him (once in a while, that is!) and turned my attention to other games. As a kid and teenager I mastered chess, spades, pinball, and anything new I could get my hands on. I joined Mensa after people started telling me I was a human calculator, but I was more interested in the arts than math!

I ended up graduating from Kent State University with an Honors BFA degree in Theater, started my own postmodern theater company (boygirl productions), and moved to Hollywood with my dream of making it as an actor. But I'll tell you what, bartending and waiting tables really sucks! So I decided to take a crack at this card counting thing, quickly devouring the library of advantage-player lore, and became a professional blackjack player. It sure as hell beat working in restaurants, and paid a lot more, too!

Soon I was splitting my time between LA and Vegas; I always say that my gambling job paid for my acting habit. But the "big break" I had waited so long for, surprisingly, came in the form of blackjack rather than acting: in 2004 I bested a field of the world's best players to come in 2nd at the inaugural World Series of Blackjack on GSN! And of course, the entire time I was calculating away, my motor mouth just couldn't stop talking trash, just like those Rummy games all those years ago.

I'm no pariah, but I was definitely the first person to harness that kind of psychological warfare in the blackjack tournament world. You see it all the time in poker, but up til then, it was considered taboo in the world of blackjack. It's supposed to be a quiet, contemplative game but I'm changing all that! The New Guard was definitely here, and the ratings speak for themselves: Hollywood Dave, the undisputed bad boy of blackjack was born.

Overnight, the TV offers started rolling in, and to date I've shot over 50 episodes of gambling television. What started with the World Series evolved into co-host on 2 seasons of Celebrity Blackjack, the Travel Channel's Vegas Challenge, A&E's Caesar's 24/7, GSN's Anything to Win, cameos on Showtime's Huff and CBS Still Standing, the resident antagonist on Spike TV's King of Vegas, and right now a return to CBS for 2 seasons of the Ultimate Blackjack Tour, among others! To put it mildly, its been a crazy rollercoaster ride the past few years & I've got my hands right where they should be: up in the air, rockin and rollin all the way!

I love living in the dual life of a professional gambler and a TV performer. My heart and soul is still firmly rooted in the arts, and my dream of making it as an actor is alive and well. I still audition here in Hollywood on an almost daily basis, so from time to time you'll catch me popping up on a commercial, episodic television show, or film. It's become harder and harder for me to play blackjack in Las Vegas, so I've increasingly turned to playing overseas, as well as playing in tons of poker tournaments.

My story is still growing, day by day, and I'm glad you're here on my site growing with me! I just published my first book, "Hollywood Blackjack," and am currently shooting the 2nd season of the Ultimate Blackjack Tour for CBS when I'm not acting in a Hollywood studio or playing online, that is! Maybe I'll see you there on the tables. Until then, rock on!

-holly deezy.