William Kienzle - Deadline for a Critic

Jane recommended Father Koesler to her daughter as a kind and helpful priest and, even more to the point, one who knew Ridley Groendal very well.

Koesler listened to Valerie’s life story, which was not much different from any other Catholic girl’s. Peculiar to Valerie was her enormous theatrical talent along with her extraordinary beauty. Unlike some similarly endowed girls, Valerie had let none of her gifts go to her head. Through the difficult high school years, she had remained in control of herself and her destiny. But, aside from her talent beauty, and self-containment, her life through high school was not markedly different from others with a parochial education.

All that of course changed when she went off to New York after high school graduation. Her parents had no money for college. In addition, Valerie could see no point in college. By consensus and her own conviction, she was ready for the stage. She was aware she had lots to learn. But she knew the next lessons would have to be in the school of hard knocks. She had no idea how hard those knocks were destined to be.

She told Koesler of arriving bright-eyed and eager in Queens, where she would stay with cousins on her father’s side. Of visiting one theatrical agency after another. She was convinced she was unsinkable. She was talented, beautiful and—if inexperienced—at least young, healthy, and willing to knock on endless doors until something inevitably opened.

She did not know until much later that almost every time a door began to open, someone was on the other side slamming it shut. That someone, she would eventually learn, was Ridley Groendal.

Valerie visited Koesler several times, each time pouring out more of her story. In the beginning, he could not tell where this was leading. But, in time, the dark shadow of Groendal was evident.

Though her cousins were gracious and kind, her presence shortly became awkward. The modest rent and board she paid, plus the sheer cost of travel in Manhattan, soon exhausted her small savings. Then it grew embarrassing. The cousins were encouraging and sympathetic, but she knew they were operating on a tight budget. They could not carry her indefinitely.

There was no alternative; she had to get a job.

The job was not long in coming. But then, Groendal was not blocking her job hunt—only because he could not. After a two-week search, Valerie was hired by Sports Gear International. The New York store was headquarters for a chain of sporting goods stores in the U.S. and Canada. The job combined clerking with occasional modeling.

In what spare time she could squeeze from her work, she continued to audition for Broadway and Off-Broadway shows. Among her attempts to break into show biz: A Chorus Line, Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dream Coat, Fiddler on the Roof, Marco Polo, and Foot Falls.

Although she invariably tried for the chorus or an understudy part, she never came close. It was a combination of her youth and comparative inexperience along with the pervasive behind-the-scenes presence of Ridley Groendal.

Meanwhile, her modeling career continued to prosper. Sports Gear International used her increasingly in display ads for everything from tennis outfits to golf equipment. It was not the theater; it was not what she had come to New York to do. But it was income she desperately needed.

Learning to live in New York City is an art and Valerie was a quick study. She was actually able to contribute a little more than was expected for her room and board. She was even able to put aside small amounts after coping with the city’s substantial cost of living.

A milestone in her life occurred when SGI selected her as a model for their Christmas catalog. Not only did this bring far wider exposure and considerably more money, but it set the occasion for her meeting William Xavier Walsh.

As Valerie told Koesler about Red Walsh, she glowed. It was easily the most significant happening of her life.

“I was putting on my makeup and I saw in the mirror this image come up behind me. Whoever it was just stood there. That makes me angry—people fooling around. So I turned. I was ready to cuss out whoever it was. And I just kept looking up, and up, and up. At the top of this towering body was this grinning face with freckles and a mop of red hair. It seemed as if he was the biggest thing I’d ever seen. I guess my mouth dropped open—like Annie Oakley’s when she meets Frank Butler.”

Koesler well remembered Annie, Get Your Gun!.

“Still, I was sore at him. I don’t know why. He was just standing there grinning at me. Anyway, I started yelling at him. It was our first fight. And it was at first sight. And it was very one-sided.”

She told Koesler that it was a long time after their first meeting before she and Walsh became friends, let alone fell in love. Walsh, at that time, was a senior at Notre Dame. After he modeled gym shoes and other athletic gear for the Christmas catalog, he returned to college and the completion of the basketball season. He was a consensus All-American in both his junior and senior years.

They dated a few times. Unfortunately, Walsh cared little for the theater, while Valerie found basketball the least interesting of major league sports. But an indefinable something drew them together. Over the months during which Walsh closed out a rather distinguished academic career, he and Valerie corresponded with increasing frequency.

She found it difficult writing him about her professional life, which had improved and disintegrated simultaneously. As a result of the Christmas catalog and the inspired activity of her agent, she had begun free-lance modeling. This new career, plus her continuing auditions for the theater, left increasingly less time for her work at SGI. Reluctantly, she left her job, sacrificing a regular and reliable paycheck for the hope of much more, if unguaranteed, money.

And so Valerie began showing up for the morning casting calls, better known by the young hopefuls who suffer through them as cattle calls. After considerable thought and prayer, she had decided against signing an agency contract. She correctly deemed such an arrangement too binding for a young person with limitless confidence in her own ability. The cattle call was the unfortunate alternative.

She actually shuddered when she recounted for Koesler the interminable months as one of New York’s most frequently photographed models. In most cases, the models knew beforehand what type of shooting each day held. If the character was going to be a housewife, the models would come dressed appropriately. Frequently it would be a beach scene. So the young women would wear bikinis under street clothing. When it was their turn, they had no more shield for changing than a curtain.

Whatever they wore to model, they would be screened, usually by a panel, usually composed of three men: a producer, a director, and someone from the ad agency. Perhaps a sponsor might be thrown in. The women would be ogled. The process was, Valerie attested, degrading. It resembled, she told Koesler, a singles bar—another area of expertise in which he was lacking. But he got the idea. And he wondered how an admittedly talented person like Valerie could have gone through it.

The answer of course was The Theater. Unlike most other women in the profession, modeling was not Val’s goal. It was a means of employment and exposure while she continued to pursue the stage.

During the 1977 theater season, among many other shows, she auditioned for Breathless, Otherwise Engaged, Ashes, and Stop the Parade.

Stop the Parade, in effect, stopped Valerie’s parade. It was the first major production in which she’d won a part—albeit that of understudy.

When he learned of her—however slight—success, Groendal was livid. His lackey, who should have been monitoring that area of Broadway, had been asleep at the switch. That worthy pleaded too vast an area of responsibility to pay attention to every broad who was hired as an understudy. Groendal reminded him that Valerie Cahill was his priority responsibility. Ridley reminded him of this just before firing him.