Jesse was quite a character and had a serious case of wanderlust. The canyon was full of unruly vegetation, and many houses didn’t have fences or gates. One night Tony and I were summoned to the yard of the neighboring house, where we found Jesse entwined with Benjamina, a black chow chow. Her owners, tired of her howling, had foolishly tethered her outside when she went into heat. She was easy pickings for all the neighborhood dogs. But it was Jesse who got caught in flagrante delicto.
To our horror, we discovered that the dogs had become stuck. While Benjamina’s owner tried to separate them by hosing them down, I called the vet. He told me to immediately stop the hosing, lower our voices, and calm down. Our hysteria was making the dogs panic. He instructed me to position Benjamina so the dogs would be the same height. Once she was up on a low stone step—magic! Jesse and Benjamina simply walked away from each other.
But the deed had been done. About two months later, Benjamina gave birth to an eclectic litter of puppies. Some looked like terriers, some like chows, some like shepherds. We didn’t want another dog, but our neighbors were trying to find homes for this motley crew.
“Tony,” I said, “not only did Jesse mate with Benjamina, he got caught in the act. As the grandparents, we have to take at least one of the puppies.” So Billy came into our lives. He was a pale sienna-colored darling little guy who fit into the palm of my hand.
After Jesse’s dalliance with Benjamina, we knew we had to get him fixed. We didn’t want him roving the canyon looking for available females. And we certainly didn’t want to keep adding puppies to our canine family.
Even after Jesse had his operation, he kept wandering the neighborhood. Instead of mating, he started bringing home a slew of female dogs that were really long in the tooth. These “old-timers,” as Tony dubbed them, would hang around our house, sometimes for weeks on end, until we could locate their owners. Eventually, Jesse brought home a chunky male named Paco—he wore a red bandanna around his neck and was constantly mounting Jesse. He was the quintessential “Latin lover” cliché and gave poor Jesse a taste of his own medicine.
After we moved to the Goldwyn house in Brentwood, I continued to work in movies, often traveling to shoot on location. When possible, Tony came with me. One evening as we were packing to leave for Monaco to film a TV special and attend a celebrity benefit tennis tournament, a call came from a shocked and tearful Angela. Dad had died of a heart attack while playing tennis on his court. I nearly fell over with disbelief.
We flew directly to Glen Rock, New Jersey, and were part of a traditional Italian-American three-day wake for my beloved father. It was comforting to be with family to acclimate to the shock of loss, and allow the memories to flow. The funeral parlor was overflowing with mourners and with gorgeous flower arrangements. My favorite one was made of white carnations in the shape of a four-foot-long tennis racket. I could almost hear my darling dad saying, “Go to Monaco and enjoy the tennis.”
Not long after Monaco, Tony and I traveled to Brazil, where I filmed Blame It on Rio, starring Michael Caine, Joe Bologna, Michelle Johnson, and a newcomer named Demi Moore, who played my daughter. Fate seemed intent on reuniting me with Joe Bologna, with whom I’d costarred in Chapter Two. Yet again, we were playing extramarital lovers. This time I would be stepping out on my husband, played by Michael Caine.
Blame It on Rio was a remake of a somewhat risqué French comedy about two fathers (played by Joe and Michael) who take their daughters on a beach vacation. During the shoot, Tony and I lived in a wonderful hotel right on the Copacabana. It was lively and colorful during the day but a little seedy—not to mention dangerous—at night, when the streets were crawling with knife-wielding transvestite pickpockets.
I had been to Brazil once before, on a celebrity cruise with Dick and other Second City performers. During the trip, Ruth Buzzi, who is more fun than you can imagine, from NBC’s Laugh-In and I became exercise and sightseeing pals. We had gone up to visit Corcovado—the magnificent gleaming white statue of Christ that overlooks Rio. The hilltop was shrouded in soft clouds. As Ruth and I approached, we saw just one other tourist enjoying the beauty. It was a big star we had both worked with—Rock Hudson. We all laughed so hard at the incongruity. Then Rock, in his best Old Testament-prophet voice, intoned, “And the swirling mist parted, and there appeared . . . Valerie Harper and Ruth Buzzi.”
This time around, I saw much more of the country. Filming on location is always a wonderful experience. Since you are working, you get to know the city or country in a more intimate way than if you’re a tourist, and you get to interact with all sorts of local people on the production. Our cheerful young driver, Nacimento, tried unsuccessfully to recommend restaurants to Tony and me. All of the menus were laden with red meat. I don’t think he grasped the concept of vegetarian, let alone vegan.
Between filming and sightseeing, Tony helped me stick to my workout regimen. Every morning we went out for a run. Up and down the Copacabana beachfront we passed unremitting soccer and volleyball games that went on day and night. Rio de Janeiro is situated way, way back from the shoreline, so everyone in the city can enjoy this glorious, enormous beach. Running is an excellent way to get to know a new place fast. We often saw Demi on the beach with her bicycle. Her commitment to fitness, as well as health food, pleased Tony, and he admired her for keeping it up.
Demi was a very sweet kid. She was talented and had that special quality that was to one day become famous. I think she was going through a breakup while we filmed; she seemed a little fragile. Since we played mother and daughter in the film, it was natural for me to take on a parental role with her. When our director, Stanley Donen, grew understandably impatient with electrical power failures or construction noise, Demi assumed, incorrectly, that it was because of her performance. So I found a quiet corner where we could rehearse our scenes, run our lines, and gingerly inch ourselves off the actor’s precipice of self-doubt.
Tony and I spent many wonderful evenings with Michael Caine. A favorite place of ours to have dinner was a French restaurant called Café Verde, which served the most delicious hearts of palm salad I have ever tasted. Michael was incredibly warm, terribly intelligent, and full of interesting stories about the places he’d traveled and the movies he’d made. In the film Zulu, in which he, a Cockney, was cast as a snobbish upper-class English officer, Michael said he mirrored Prince Philip’s walk and demeanor to appear sufficiently aristocratic. (The prince, always accompanied by guards, walked with his hands clasped behind his back, having no need to use his fists to defend himself.) Actors do many things to bring authenticity to a part. I thought this one was particularly creative.
Even after decades in front of the camera, Michael’s passion for acting hadn’t waned. He came to the set every day full of enthusiasm and ideas. He was always looking for ways to improve his performance and get even more out of a scene. Michael was a pleasure to work with, a wonderful actor, and a delightful man.
The original movie on which Blame It on Rio was based was a sexy romp of a film that only the French could get away with. In some scenes, our version seemed like a borderline skin flick. It didn’t help that the plot revolved around Michael Caine’s character having an affair with his best friend’s teenage daughter, played by Michelle Johnson.
It wasn’t Michelle’s fault that she was extraordinarily buxom, but Stanley Donen seemed never to miss an opportunity to have her bouncing about topless. There was a scene early in the film where Joe and Michael stumble upon their daughters, Michelle and Demi, at a topless beach and are duly embarrassed. Perhaps Stanley figured, “Well, we’ve seen her chest once, so let’s see it again. And again.” If not for Michael Caine’s innate grace and elegant charm, which greatly minimized any offensive tone, the picture would not have worked at all, despite a truly funny Larry Gelbart script.
Several months after Blame It on Rio came out, I got a letter from a nun at St. Mary’s Academy in Monroe, Michigan, where I’d gone in fifth grade. “I know you�
��re a St. Mary’s girl,” she wrote, “so how could you appear in such a movie as Blame It on Rio?”
I wrote back and explained that I wasn’t in any of the more explicit scenes, and I’d had no idea the director would have the young actress take off her blouse so many times. Sorry, Sister . . . and come to think of it, just how is it that you saw the movie?
While I loved doing films, Tony and I thought that it would be a sound career choice to develop a new TV show of our own. We had already done a two-hour dramatic pilot called Farrell for the People, which hadn’t been picked up but proved to be a very good experience. I played Liz Farrell, an assistant DA in New York City based on Linda Fairstein, the pioneering head of sex crimes prosecution for twenty-six years. Linda, now the famed crime novelist, fourteen books so far, helped us enormously with the film. The two detectives with whom she worked closely were Charlie Bardong, played by Gregory Sierra, and Jay Lynam, played by Ed O’Neill.
It was shortly after Farrell that Mary remarried. Robert Levine, a Jewish doctor, was precisely what Ida would have wanted for Rhoda. Tony and I attended their elegant wedding at the Pierre Hotel in New York. Another reunion occurred on The Love Boat Nile River cruise with my old Mary Tyler Moore buddy Gavin MacLeod (“The Captain”). He tried to insist we take his state room, which was larger. Same sweetie. Tony and I both had parts in the show and the trip was beyond fascinating—seeing the ancient Egyptian sites, riding a camel, visiting exotic marketplaces. I saw a pretty, young shopper in her black traditional dress kneeling by a basket selecting fruit with one hand. In the other arm she held an infant and over her shoulder she balanced a sleeping two-year-old girl. This extraordinary mom gripped the sleeping child’s dress firmly in her teeth to prevent a fall while getting the food shopping done. Touching. And on Mother’s Day, too!
For years Tony had immersed himself in the business side of show business, an area I have little knowledge of and no interest in learning. As the head of our production company, TAL Productions, Tony arranged a meeting with Lee Rich, the president of a company called Lorimar. They were responsible for some of the most successful television series of the era, Dallas, Knots Landing, and Falcon Crest.
Lee suggested we team up with another production duo—Tom Miller and Bob Boyett, who had a deal with Lorimar to develop a show. Miller and Boyett had come off some major successes, Happy Days and Laverne & Shirley, and were interested in launching a new series. Lee thought that together we might come up with a vehicle in which I could star.
Tony set up shop for TAL Productions on the MGM lot right next door to Bob and Tom’s office. They were eager to develop a show for me, and it was decided that Tony would come on board as co-executive producer. Bob and Tom generously shared their considerable experience and know-how with him.
Of the many ideas we tossed around, we decided on one we liked for a series. The beauty of the concept was its simplicity—a mom at home alone, coping with three boys. With such a basic canvas, there would be lots of room to explore different story lines. Nobody wanted the mother to be a widow, which seemed too sad; or divorced, which would lead to a lot of dating drama; this show was to be centered around family, around a mother’s relationship with her sons. We decided to make the husband an airline pilot, a job that would excuse his frequent absences.
So the concept for Valerie was born.
Now we had to sell it to a network. This proved more difficult than we’d anticipated. CBS was interested in the show but was willing only to commission a pilot, with no guarantee that they’d pick up the series. NBC, however, offered to order a pilot and seven episodes. NBC it was, then. We knew we had to prove ourselves quickly to encourage the network to order additional shows. We got down to work, deciding stories, crafting the pilot. I was excited to be getting back into a series, especially one in which Tony and I would have creative input and control. I expected everything to go swimmingly, especially because I loved my young costars. They were wonderful kids and so much fun. Jason Bateman, an excellent actor even back then, played my eldest son, David. Danny Ponce and Jeremy Licht—both so talented—played my younger set of fraternal twins, Willy and Mark.
I had been involved in only two series before, both run by Jim Brooks, Allan Burns, and later, Charlotte Brown. I trusted entirely these three, their writing staffs, and their style of working. During the nine years they wrote for me as Rhoda Morgenstern, we never butted heads. Above all else, these writers set and maintained an atmosphere of creative give-and-take in which suggestions were welcome.
When we got down to rehearsing Valerie, I was in for a shock. I was used to an open discussion among the writers, directors, and the actors. After we finished a run-through, the writers would whisper among themselves, then gather with the producers and staff, away from the actors, to talk about improvements. Then off they’d go to their offices to rewrite. It felt cold and corporate. I sorely missed the collaborative energy on the sets of Mary Tyler Moore and Rhoda, and I’m afraid I was guilty of pushing my way of preparing the show onto my colleagues.
One thing I don’t regret was my requirement that we rehearse until a scene was really working and that everyone use their props. As Mary often warned, “You don’t want any unpleasant surprises on show night.” One time we were doing a winter scene, and I suggested the boys work with their mittens and scarves during the final run-though. The director thought it was unnecessary and nitpicky. I ceded the point. But that night in front of the audience, when the kids made their entrance, they were all tangled in their scarves and dropping their mittens. Mary’s “unpleasant surprise.” We had to stop the scene and reshoot. It’s not simply a question of wasting time and money; rather, it’s better for the live audience and the show if things go smoothly.
In addition to having a more rigorous rehearsal period, I also wanted Valerie to be funnier. After taping one middling episode, I went up to one of the staff members and said, “Hey, we filmed that whole scene and there wasn’t a single laugh from the audience.”
“Don’t worry,” he said, “there will be in post.”
I couldn’t believe it. Rather than make the material better so the audience would react on show night, it seemed fine with him to add canned laughter in post-production. Coming from Mary Tyler Moore and Rhoda, where the audience’s laughter was paramount, I found that attitude appalling.
Some of the episodes were terrific. I’m extremely proud of one very realistic, hilarious episode for which we won an award. It was an artfully written script about David (Jason Bateman) surreptitiously buying condoms. Serious subject matter like smoking, drugs, sex, and the pitfalls of modern adolescence can be communicated through comedy. Having raised Wendy and having spent a lot of time with Leah’s kids, I understood how important these issues are to adolescents and their parents. I’d seen it all—moodiness, crushes, sibling rivalry.
In 1987, during a hiatus from the second season of filming, Tony and I took a trip to Italy. We were sitting in a café on Via Veneto, watching the high-class hookers stroll by, when Tony said, “Valerie, you should be a mother.”
I’m not sure if it was the Chianti, the warm Roman air, or the fact that I wasn’t a Mom but played one on TV that brought about the announcement, but I thanked him nonetheless.
“I think we should adopt,” Tony concluded.
At forty-six, I’d pretty much accepted the fact that pregnancy wasn’t in the cards for me. I had thought about adoption and was so happy that Tony was considering it, too. Since we had the wherewithal to give a child a wonderful home and upbringing, when we returned to Los Angeles, we began looking into adoption.
Through Tony’s screenwriter friend Robert Klane, we discovered an amazing attorney named Durand Cook, a local lawyer who specialized in adoption. Durand was committed to bringing together children and parents to create a perfectly matched, mutually loving, newly organic family. We were thrilled to be beneficiaries of his knowledge, skill, and love. Durand assured us that it would be no problem matching us to a ch
ild. He handled domestic and international adoptions, both open and closed. Since I was famous, we decided to go with a closed adoption. Durand looked for a situation in which the birth mother wanted anonymity as well.
One day Tony called to tell me that Durand had found a little girl for us. That afternoon Tony came home with a photo album filled with pictures of the most adorable blond four-year-old child. Her story was an unusual one. Her birth parents’ marriage ended in divorce and her mother, then in the Marine Corps, put the eighteen-month-old baby into private child care with a woman known as Nanny. Other children were in Nanny’s care only during the day, but this little girl lived with her full-time.
When the birth mother left the service, she and her boyfriend traveled constantly for work and paid Nanny to take care of her child. When the little girl was approaching her fourth birthday, the boyfriend, who himself had been adopted, encouraged the mother to put her daughter up for adoption. They both agreed that it would be the best thing for the little girl.
Durand explained that the child would be flying from North Carolina to California that evening, and we could see how things went over the weekend. “Remember,” he said, “unlike an infant, a four-year-old is a fully formed little person. Let’s make sure this is a perfect fit.” He told us that there were five other adoptive couples waiting in the wings, so we shouldn’t feel any pressure if things didn’t seem right.
Many couples only want to adopt an infant. But for us, her age was perfect. Over the years, I had grown accustomed to children of all ages coming to live with me. Wendy, Dick’s daughter, moved in with us when she was thirteen and quickly accepted my role as her stepmother. My sister’s children, Victor, Anton, and Tanya, had been staying with me off and on from the time they were babies. I was very comfortable taking on mothering duties at any stage in a child’s life. With a four-year-old, we could avoid diapers, all-night screaming, and when she turned eighteen, we’d only be sixty instead of sixty-four.
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