(3 of 8)
The only expression Valerie Harper cannot seem to register is vanity. "I'm not a star," she insists. "I'm the same old shlep I always have been." She has it backwards; Valerie is no shlep; she is the same star she always has been, only now she is being paid like one—about $15,000 a show. This sudden rise in fortune has done worlds for her wallet but little for her psyche. Last week, in a rare moment of leisure, she confessed a recent dream to TIME Correspondent Leo Janos. "My three favorite actresses in the world—Anna Magnani, Anne Bancroft and Maureen Stapleton—invited me to perform with them in a play. I pleaded that I didn't know the part, but they told me not to worry; then they glided through a glass door and escorted me onto the stage. I stood there befuddled and speechless while they performed brilliantly. It was a classic actress's nightmare."
That bad dream is born of restless self-doubt. The daughter of a hockey player turned salesman, Valerie caromed from Canada across the U.S. with her parents until they were divorced. Wherever she went, the chunky, shinyeyed kid kept up her dancing lessons.
Mrs. Harper was sure that her little girl could perform for considerably more than kicks, and Mama knew best. By the time Valerie was 15, she was dancing in specialty numbers at Radio City Music Hall. "It was $70 a week, four shows a day," recalls the would-be Rockette, "forming shapes of Presidents' heads or twirling umbrellas—really class stuff." It took a while to graduate from that class. Val was next seen in the chorus of Li'I Abner, a musical that toured Las Vegas, then was filmed in Hollywood. During her stay in town, Valerie failed to contract anything but hepatitis. "The doctor told me to eat lots of bread and sugar to keep my strength up," she says. "What went up was my weight—from about 130 to 150."
HOCKEY STAR: Rhoda, I'm not talking about a one-night stand. We're in town till Thursday.
Back in New York City, she had a Rhoda-like private life: "All I saw in those days were dear homosexual friends or guys who were like brothers.
Serious dancers didn't get the heavy dates. The dancers who really scored were the nightclub chorines." In 1964 the fraternal dates were replaced permanently by Second City Actor Dick Schaal. Valerie joined her new husband's troupe and learned the fine art of improvisation.
Between industrial shows and Broadway musicals— Wildcat, Take Me Along—the dancer-actress became involved in a cacophony of labor disputes. She picketed General Motors for more integrated industrial shows and demonstrated for more blacks in Producer David Merrick's musicals. "One of the GM executives used to wink at me," says Valerie. "David Merrick, whom we called the Prince of Darkness, came out and said, 'You'll never work for me again.' "