Is Alyssa Milano really charmed? Recently, one of her cats jumped off a second-floor balcony in her Benedict Canyon house and sailed 20 feet to the atrium floor, shrieking like a hellcat en route. "She made this horrifying sound, like I've never heard before," says Milano. Kitty didn't land on its feet as expected, so Milano swooped down (the stairs) after her and picked up the sprawled feline, ready to administer last rites. "But she started purring seconds later, and I thought, 'This is a special cat.'"
     Whether it's Milano or her cat that is charmed, we're not sure. But we do know that the star is definitely on the high road. After growing up in front of our eyes for eight seasons as Tony Danza's adorable daughter, Samantha, on ABC's Who's the Boss?, Milano busted out, literally, as a sex icon, showing up on Melorse Place in full vixen form. From there, she was hand-picked to star in the WB's cult occult hit Charmed, where Milano plays Phoebe, who finds she's possessed of magical powers and spends her days and nights warding off satanic demons. Off-screen, Milano is delightfully grounded and level-headed.
     She's reading the newspaper and sipping coffee when I meet her at a deli in Bel Air at 9 a.m., 90 minutes before she has to be on the set of Charmed. She's so pretty and, yes, charming that it's hard to believe she once portrayed the harsh Long Island Lolita in a television movie about Amy Fisher.
You spent your entire formative years in the living rooms of America.
I went from 11 to 19: prepuberty, puberty, adolescence, adulthood. It was probably the best way for me to grow up in this business because it meant stability. It was seeing the same people every day. I know a lot of child actors who have major abandonment issues because they became friends with a movie crew for three months or bonded with the cast of a play for a year and then never talked to any of those people again. But when it came time for Who's the Boss? to end after eight years, I was old enough to understand that.

Did Tony Danza protect you in a controlling, macho Italian kind of way?
I have Italian parents, so it was relative to my world. I had uncles and cousins who did the same thing. Tony wasn't any more parental than my father was. I was with him for eight years. He's Italian, and that's what they do. [Laughs]
How did your website, safesearching.com, come about?
My little brother, Cory, who was 12 at the time, went on the Internet and typed in my name and found me on a lot of porn sites. He was devastated. It was a major family dilemma. My lawyer said that, even if the pictures were legitimate, they couldn't use my likeness for their income without permission. Those people were making 30 grand a month off me.
What did your mother do?
She started a company called CyberTrackers that sent harassing e-mails to pornmasters to make them take down Internet pictures of her celebrity clients. Threatening them was mostly successful, but lawsuits came about because of those who wouldn't cooperate. We settled 15 cases out of court and one went to trial and won us $250,000.
     Then I thought, 'Oh, shit, this is karmicly wrong and I'm going to hell!' So we decided to use the money to start this search engine and network that would be porn-free and eventually have original programming - safesearching.com.
The site has the very-hot-indeed version of your Candie's perfume commercial. Do you like being a sex object?
Yeah, I like it to an extent. I grew up in such a well-rounded family; my parents were obviously having sex. They probably continue to, although now it makes me a little ill to think about it. [Laughs] My parents had a healthy attitude toward sex; it wasn't a dirty, awful thing. So I like appearing sexy to people.
It doesn't bother you that boys might be a little over-excited by your image?
I don't think about that.
What do you like best about boys?
I love boys! Physically, I like the backs of their necks. And I love how they think they're different from us and how they're really not. I'm turned on by a really attractive man who is not afraid to make himself look like an asshole for a joke, who's secure enough in his beauty to be absolutely ridiculous.
You were once engaged to [Party of Five's] Scott Wolf. Does it make you sad to talk about him?
It's not sad to talk about it now. We're like bookends.
Tell us about your marriage to musician Cinjun Tate? [Cinjun, Gaelic for St. John, is in the band Remy Zero.]
We met at a mutual friend's party. That night, I knew I was gonna marry him. We talked for eight hours straight.
Now for some fun stuff. Describe yourself to me.
I'm incredibly earthy. I like getting dirty. I'm loyal in friendships. Compassionate. Passionate – that's the Italian thing. I'm dedicated to my work, to an extent. I love what I do, but when it gets to the point of taking up every facet of my life I'll move to a ranch somewhere in Canada. I'm maternal. I'm domestic. I cook.
In what order would you give up sex, fame and money?
Fame first, money second, then sex.

A L Y S S A 'S A L L U R E

*Beauty Secret: "I don't use deodorant - too much aluminum in it. I use a crystal. That's my beauty secret." *Tattoo Tattler: "I have a fairy on my hip, a Hindu peace symbol on my left wrist, rosary beads on my back, an angel holding a cross on one ankle and a chain of roses on the other." *Diet Dos: "Every Sunday night my mother cooks pasta and sauce with meatballs and sausage and breaded mushrooms. It's my comfort food." *First Crush: My first boyfriend was - are you ready for this? This is so cheesy. It was Kirk Cameron. I was 13 and he was 14. He used to dedicate songs to me on the radio, but I broke up with him. I just couldn't deal with it." *Love Advice: "Don't settle. A relationship should be beautiful, and easy, and supportive - everything you've always dreamed of."