Barry suggested that I ask some of my costars to make declarations on my behalf. When I called Judy Kahan, who played my neighbor on Valerie, to see if she would be willing to make a statement about my behavior on-set during that final show, she immediately replied, “How many languages do you want it in?” What a gal!
At Barry’s request, Carol Burnett had generously agreed to help with testimony and to watch footage of the final taping of Valerie. Barry had won a case for Carol Burnett against The National Enquirer, which claimed that she had fallen down drunk out on the street. Carol, who has had a family member struggle with alcohol, couldn’t stand the false allegations and went after the tabloid. With Barry’s help, she achieved an amazing victory over the Enquirer, something no one had done before.
The depositions and the trial, which lasted over two months, were grueling. I was deposed at length—tedious and often painful questions about my time on-set and my strained relations with the writer-producers. My mother, who was sick with lung cancer, had moved in with us and was particularly ill during the trial. Every day I couldn’t be with her because I had to be in court was a struggle for me; my lovely friend Norma Donaldson would come sit with my mother so she wouldn’t have to be alone. When Norma was unavailable, Vera, our crackerjack Yugoslavian nanny, took care of both my mother and Cristina—my older and my younger blondes, as I used to refer to them. Vera, with her sparkling demeanor, was a sensational cook and had worked in several top-notch Roman trattorias. She kept everyone in our house well fed, well cared for, and smiling, especially during this difficult period.
Despite the help I received from both Norma and Vera, there were times when I didn’t feel I should leave my mother’s side. One day when my mom was really suffering, I called the opposing counsel and explained that I had to stay home. They were very gracious and canceled that day’s deposition.
The lynchpin of the case was a tape of the final show I filmed—the show that Lorimar claimed directly led to my firing. Lorimar contended that my behavior that night was unstable and threatening. As often happens, cameras roll between takes on show night, so a complete document of the evening had been recorded. Before the trial, Barry called Carol Burnett as an expert witness to assess the evidence.
The scene that concerned Lorimar most was one in which I, as the mom, was supposed to scold Jason’s character, David. They maintained that my acting was overly aggressive and that I was out of control with my young costar. The director had asked me to do the scene three times, each time with a different intention.
Carol Burnett, an undeniable expert on television comedy acting, had already watched the tape of the entire evening. When she got to the three takes of the scene in question, her evaluation was: “This is great. She did the same scene three ways, so the producers had three choices when they edited it. She was soft with her son. Then she was tough on him. Then she was in between. One scene, three distinct ways. Not only is this a good performance, it’s great.”
Carol also had something complimentary to say about the raw footage of the evening—the filmed record of what happened between takes. “Look,” she said, “Valerie doesn’t seem angry or upset between takes. In fact, you can see her laughing with the boys and joking with the audience. She’s going beyond her duties as an actress. This is not unprofessional behavior in the least.”
The show’s director, Howard Storm, also came to my defense and in court told the judge that he had instructed me to bring anger to the scene during one take. “That last take was a little soft, Val,” he remembered saying. “This take, really let David have it.” I had, appropriately, been taking his directions.
After Carol’s powerful testimony, Lorimar had to take off the table their allegation that I was “unable to perform.” It was clear I hadn’t endangered the boys and that I’d comported myself professionally all evening. Soon all they were left with was the charge that I was unhappy in my job. People are unhappy in their jobs all the time, but they don’t get fired for it. Truth be told, I wasn’t unhappy. I wanted our contract upheld.
An executive from Lorimar accidentally tilted the verdict in my favor when she got on the stand and admitted that Lorimar had never bothered to draw up a long-form contract with me. We had signed a short-form contract, which is an interim agreement. But the parties involved were required to sign the official long-form document if the series was to proceed. An old friend from The Mary Tyler Moore Show days, Sue Cameron, was very helpful when she took the stand to verify specific contract terms.
Barry had complete command of the courtroom. He was a tremendous counselor with amazing attention to detail. He saw us through to victory. The court ruled that I’d been wrongfully fired and that Lorimar was to be held accountable.
The next day there was an enormous picture of me on the cover of the Los Angeles Times business section, under the heading: “SHE WON!”
I felt vindicated. I had beaten Lorimar and reclaimed my reputation. All the false claims that had been bandied about before and during the trial could be put to rest. The industry and the public no longer suspected I was an unstable actress on the verge of a breakdown. It was proven that I had been wrongfully terminated. As Bill Hayes, the dean of entertainment law, said, “Val, not since Bette Davis took on MGM has a female actor taken on a huge Hollywood corporation.” I’d stood up for myself and Tony had stood right up with me. Thanks to Barry Langberg and our excellent legal team, we won.
I’m sure there were people out there without the facts who viewed me as a greedy actress suing for more money, but money was not the primary issue. Fair treatment was. I had been wrongfully fired, and now the public knew. Even today, entertainment lawyers refer to the Valerie Harper case as being beneficial to actors because it’s now harder for studios to back out of short-form contracts.
The judge awarded me a substantial settlement for loss of income for season three of Valerie. He also ruled that I was to be a profit participant on future syndication. Although mine was by no means an earth-shattering case, winning was a huge deal for me. Since Barry had ensured that the trial would take place as soon as possible, my career could get back on track, and business could resume as usual. No one was happier about this than Mom. She laughed out loud and shook her weak little fist: “You kids did it! You won!” This was pure joy—joy that we were able to experience together.
Now that the case was settled, I was free to stay at home with my daughter as well as with my mother, who was entering the last months of her life. I didn’t want to miss out on precious time with her because of some legal entanglement. My mother was furious about her lung cancer. She had never smoked, and as a nurse, she had devoted her life to taking care of others. It just didn’t seem fair. This was her second go-round with cancer, too. She’d been diagnosed with encapsulated lung cancer five years earlier and had invasive surgery to remove the tumor.
My mother was still working as a nurse in San Francisco when her cancer returned. Way back before PETA, I’d given her a full-length, white mink coat that gave her such pleasure. In her dramatic fur, she came to be known as the Queen of Polk Street, as she was an extremely popular “gal.”
Living in San Francisco and working in the nursing profession, my mom had lots of devoted friends, many of them gay men. She called them her “lavender boys” because it seemed more respecful to her. When her illness progressed to a point where it seemed best for her to come live with me, I threw her a going-away party in her San Francisco apartment building. The party room was wall-to-wall gay guys, all of whom were excited to see Rhoda Morgenstern in the flesh, but even more interested in seeing off their beloved Iva. I dressed my mother in her favorite dress and did her makeup. All of Polk Street turned out for the party—waiters, bartenders, pals, nursing colleagues. It was a terrific send-off.
Tony and I moved my mother into the ground floor of our house in Beverly Hills. I converted an office into a comfortable bedroom and decorated it with favorite items from her San Francisco apartment. Our dogs
, Jesse and Billy, often sat with her, keeping her company and standing guard.
Her condition worsened by the day. As she grew sicker, she began to imagine that she was at sea. “Valerie,” she said, “that air! It’s just wonderful. Don’t you love the smell of the salty ocean air, Tony?” Then she’d comment on how adorable Cristina was. She had a fascinating way of weaving this imaginary shipboard experience right in with reality.
If Jesse and Billy wandered into the room, she’d say, “It’s so wonderful that the captain allows dogs on board this ship, don’t you think? You know, this is such a stable vessel, I barely feel it moving.”
One afternoon my mother asked me, “What does ‘three bells’ mean?”
“Oh, Mom, are we back on the ship?”
“What ship?” she said. “We’re in your house. I just want to know what ‘three bells’ means.”
I was trying to enter her fantasy, but she just wanted a straight answer about naval timekeeping. I felt the fool! But, oh, it was funny.
One day Mom was in extraordinary pain. She asked me to give her enough morphine, enough to end her life. Her doctor had told me how to handle the situation.
“Mom,” I said. “Why don’t you take the regular dose now, wait a couple of hours then see if it’s still what you want to do.”
In two hours, I came back into her room, praying that she had changed her mind about the morphine, and asked how she was feeling. “What time is Perry Mason on?” she asked.
“In about an hour,” I said.
“Okay, let’s watch Perry Mason instead.” It seemed like a better option than assisted suicide.
Another day Mom took my hand and said, “Val, I’m so sorry you have to preside over this death watch.”
“Listen, you,” I said, “when you’re dead, it will be a death watch. But you’re alive, so it’s a life watch.”
She had taken care of terminal patients throughout her career, and she knew firsthand how draining it could be. One morning when I came into her room, she said brightly, “This is the best day of my life.” Then she told me about a dream she’d had. “It was wonderful, Valerie. I saw Mom and Dad and Aunt Kate and all my uncles. We were at a picnic on a hill, eating delicious food. Everyone was wearing white dresses and suits and we were all laughing. I’m not afraid of dying anymore, because I know where I’m going.” My whole life, she had been such a positive fun-loving person. She always tried to see the good in everyone and everything. Two days after her dream, she died.
Tony and Cristina were out on the lawn when Mom passed. I signaled to Tony that it had happened, and they returned to the house. Cristina ran up to me. “Mommy, Mommy,” she said. Then she looked at Tony. “What’s my line?”
“I’m sorry Grandma died,” Tony said.
“I’m sorry Grandma died,” Cristina repeated to me earnestly.
It was so wonderful that I couldn’t help but smile. What’s my line? Clearly, she’s the daughter of a theater couple.
I was deeply saddened by my mother’s passing. Even though I was prepared, it was still a wrenching final good-bye. During the last weeks of her life, she had become so fragile and wasted away from her illness. Carl Reiner told me, “When a parent dies of something slow and painful, for a while you will remember how she was when she died. But then that image fades, and you’ll remember her as she was before.”
Carl was right. When I think of her now, she’s wearing her pretty red dress, pounding out a ragtime tune on the piano, or she’s sashaying in that white mink coat. Then there is her boisterous, heartfelt laugh, the costumes she sewed me, the air baths, “The Blue Danube” on her record player, her patient smile during the hours and hours of ballet lessons she watched. Rhoda and all my other successes gave her such pleasure. It is impossible for me to even reflect on my career or on my life without thinking about my mother’s part in it.
chapter
TWELVE
In 1990, a few years after we won the court case, I was offered a deal at CBS to develop my own show. Both Tony and I really admired Paul Haggis, one of the talented writers and directors of the hit show thirtysomething. (Today, of course, he is an Academy Award winner.) We were delighted to discover that he was eager to partner with us.
Paul came up with a fantastic idea for a show called Desperate Women that involved four women from one family living together under one roof. My character was a political wife originally from Brooklyn whose politician husband has left her and their teenage daughter. The other women were my recently widowed mother, my aunt, a nun who has lost her faith, and a Southern-belle divorcée friend. I absolutely loved the script and was excited to be part of a show featuring such strong female characters.
CBS was on board at first, but then their enthusiasm waned and they wanted to bring in a new team of writers to develop another half-hour comedy. Tony, as producer, stood firm. He and I both felt that it was wrong for the network to lose such a fine writer just because they’d gone sour on the project. “We love Paul and his writing,” Tony said, “and we’ve been working with him all year. How about you give him another chance to come up with different material?”
Paul, an extremely prolific writer, had another idea that he turned into a show called City. It was an unusually funny script with a touch of zany. I played the city manager of an unnamed metropolis dealing with budget cuts, corruption, and bureaucracy. LuAnne Ponce, the sister of Danny Ponce, who played my son on Valerie, was cast as my daughter on City. We both dyed our hair auburn so we would look even more alike.
One of my favorite episodes guest-starred adorable Estelle Getty (Sofia on The Golden Girls) as a very confused former city manager. In between rehearsals for City, we shared funny theater stories, as Estelle had, like me, started out on the New York stage. She loved telling one story about a handsome young man with a ton of sex appeal and no talent who was cast as a Roman centurion in some gladiator period musical. He was to knock on the city gate and say his one line. A ball of nervous tension, he pounded so hard on the gate that the entire set, fake stone walls and all, crashed down onto the stage. When the laughter from the audience and cast subsided, this foolish kid belts out his line: “Open up, in the name of Rome!” All week every chance she got, Estelle repeated the ill-fated line to me, even slipping a note under my dressing room door. She was such a doll—a kind, wonderful, completely genuine person.
A wild collection of exuberant, unpredictable, and some certifiable characters populated my office at city hall, and the onscreen relationships were witty and eccentric. All of the actors were really super in their roles, and we were lucky enough to have Allan Burns come on board as a consultant.
Paul was incredibly quick and funny, capable of producing brilliant material consistently. City was smart and dealt with a number of issues, from socioeconomic discrepancy to political ethics. Since the network wanted the show on the air quickly, we had to produce it in about half the usual time. Paul spent all weekend in the editing room, getting the show ready for that Monday’s evening airtime. City burst into the Nielsen top ten, where it stayed for a few weeks. But slowly, ratings began to decline. Although we had reasonable numbers for the duration of our thirteen-episode first season, CBS didn’t renew us for the fall.
It was a big disappointment. City was a strong show and well received, and I felt that if we had been given the chance, we would have picked up speed in the second season. CBS thought otherwise. When we were canceled, Paul threw a wonderfully raucous party at the Reseda roller rink with pizza and a huge cake. I think I ate six pieces, using the show cancellation as an excuse. I was sad to see this fabulous group break up. I had so hoped that we would make a go of it together. The cast and crew said our good-byes, and we all moved on to new projects.
Throughout the 1980s I starred in numerous television movies and often Tony and I took Cristina on location, many times to New York City. She loved hotel life (room service, tiny shampoo bottles, mini-bar goodies) and one time my new motherhood was sorely tested. F
lipping around the TV channels my precious little daughter landed on a late-night porn channel where the scene was a group orgy! Horrified, I quickly changed the channel saying, “Oh, that’s boring.” Then I thought, I’d better “parent up,” and I casually asked, “What was that?” and Cristina said, “I think they were trying to be models.” Whew! Close call!
After City, I also did many guest spots, including a Perry Mason movie special that Mom would have loved! My madrina (Italian for stepmom) Angela was celebrating Ginger’s wedding to a handsome Irish-American, Jim Gilmartin, in what used to be known as a “mixed wedding.” All three Cacciottis were part of the wedding party. The reception was a fabulous “do” in the Grand Ballroom of the Plaza Hotel with two hundred guests, including the Mary Tyler Moore cast mates who could make it, Gavin and Georgia, plus my second family, the Almogs. Penny and I teared up about her wedding having been on the same day Ginger was born.
I did one outrageous part on a show called Promised Land, which starred my good pal Gerald (Mac) MacRaney. Promised Land was written and produced by the Touched by an Angel super-talented team, Martha Williamson and Jon Andersen. The show was a family drama that filmed in the environs of Salt Lake City, Utah. I was cast as an eccentric children’s book writer, an eclectic dresser who wears crazy flowing robes and lives a wildly unorthodox life and turns out to be a cocaine addict. Go figure. In the script, Mac’s young son is fascinated by me and comes over to my mysterious mansion. The first time, he encounters me sitting on my porch flanked by two enormous snarling black dogs. The next time, I’m sitting in the backyard with a lion. I’d gotten over my fear of dogs and in fact had recently added a third canine to our family—a ball of white fluff named Archie. But a lion? It was going to be an interesting shoot.
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