[1] [2] Her older sister is Olympic swimmer Donna de Varona and her aunt was silent film actress Miriam Cooper.
After Clown Around, Joanna also got parts in the New York Shakespeare Festival's production of Two Gentlemen of Verona and Ulysses in Nighttown, where she was directed by Burgess Meredith.
[citation needed] During the late 1970s and early 1980s, Kerns started making a name for herself in guest spots on many televisions shows that included: Emergency!, CHiPs, The A-Team, Starsky & Hutch, Street Hawk, Laverne and Shirley, Three's Company, Hill Street Blues, The Love Boat, Hunter, Quincy, M.E., Magnum, P.I., and V, as well as many commercials.
[9] During the success of Growing Pains, Kerns began to star in television movies, where she played controversial parts very different from the beloved all-American mom, Maggie Seaver.
One such performance that shocked audiences was her 1992 movie, The Nightman, in which Kerns played a highly sexual business woman who was a motel owner.
Her many TV movies include: Those She Left Behind, Blind Faith, The Big One: The Great Los Angeles Earthquake, Shameful Secrets, and No One Could Protect Her.
She has also directed episodes of television shows including Dawson's Creek, Titans, Scrubs, Private Practice, Psych, Felicity, Grey's Anatomy, Privileged, ER, Ghost Whisperer, Army Wives, Pretty Little Liars, Switched at Birth, The Goldbergs, This Is Us, and Fuller House.
[citation needed] Kerns also directed Annie Potts in an original made-for-television movie for Lifetime TV entitled: Defending Our Kids: The Julie Posey Story.
[13] In 2004, Kerns wrote a letter of support for convicted sex offender Brian Peck, who had worked on the set of Growing Pains, before his sentencing in the case.