Ivonnah Erskine has been modeling since a child with her mother––who gave her the nickname “Ham” for her love of the spotlight—and then winning the New Day Associates Model of the Year competition by accident (she originally thought it was a showcase) in 2002, she found herself at her first casting call. “I had no idea what I was in for,” remembers Ivonnah of her interview for Swizz Beatz' “Big Business” vid. “The only reason I got that was because of Benny [Boom]. My comp card was crap! I didn't know [Benny] at the time but later on I found out he was the guy who walked into the room and asked who I was.”

“Yo, that's the girl from the Young Gunz video!” is what New Haven, CT model Ivonnah heard wherever she went after playing the orientation leader in “Can't Stop, Won't Stop.” It only got worse when she followed her leading-lady role in Avant's “Read Your Mind” with appearances in Jay-Z's “La-La-La” and D-Block's “2 Gunz Up.” Now, with the mocha-flavored beauty upgrading current burners like Ghostface and Missy's “Tush,” Twista and Kanye's “Overnight Celebrity” and Method Man and Busta's “What's Happenin',” it's gonna take the 25-year-old Native-/African-American sweetness a lot longer to get from point A to point B.

After landing her casino girl role in “Big Business,” opportunity knocked down doors left and right—for nothing less than feature roles. Ivonnah even had to quit her job as a hairstylist to answer all of her casting requests. Maybe it's her criminal lip game. Could be her lightning-strike eyes. Or just her deceptively curvy hourglass, that keeps her in demand. Whatever it is, it's got the video game about as easy as free throws for love. “If the director likes what he sees you're gonna get your shine,” she shrugs with an “it's-nothing” smile.

“When I did ‘Big Business' I didn't even know what a feature, an extra, a principal was. I never had to experience how it feels to be an extra. And I got shown more than any of the other girls. Like, this one girl on the set of Sean Paul's “Like Glue” was actually stepping on our toes to get us out of the shot. I don't have time for that. I'll go to the back, just give me my check.”

With a spot in State Property 2 and currently under contract for Akademiks' spring line, '04 is sure to bring Ms. I plenty of those checks in the manner in which she loves to get them—with ease. And to think, she's built such a quality catalog while raising her eight-year-old son Christian. “I know a lot of women in this industry who don't take care of their kids and I can't be like that,” she says. “My mom is like, ‘Move to LA, I'll take Christian.' I can't do that. He's a huge part of my life. If I'm gone for two weeks, I miss him. But I never let having a child stop me.”